Winter Storm Fern knocked out power for millions of people across the US and reignited a familiar political and media fight over what really causes large-scale outages during extreme weather. To separate the rhetoric from the operational reality, Electrek spoke with Leah Qusba, CEO of GoodPower, a research, strategic communications, and campaigning organization focused on advancing the global renewable energy transition.
In this Q&A, Qusba walks through what tends to fail first during major winter storms, what outage data shows about the role of wind, solar, and fossil generation during Fern, why fuel supply and winterization still matter more than the generation mix, and how coordinated disinformation campaigns exploit moments of uncertainty after grid emergencies and what works to counter them.
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