DOE official says natural gas, coal and nuclear kept power flowing during winter storm
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Summary
Alex Fitzsimmons of the Department of Energy told the Scott Jennings show that emergency orders and dispatchable generators — including natural gas, coal and nuclear plants — supplied roughly 85% of power during a recent winter storm and that DOE actions prevented retirements of about 17 gigawatts.
Alex Fitzsimmons, director of the Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response at the U.S. Department of Energy, said emergency orders and traditional generators kept power flowing during a recent nationwide winter storm.
"We deployed more than 64,000 personnel to rapidly restore power to almost 1,000,000 people who were impacted by the storm," Fitzsimmons said in an interview on the Scott Jennings show. He credited frontline workers and energy-sector crews for restoration efforts.
Fitzsimmons said most distribution outages were caused by ice falling on lines but that the bulk power system "stood up." He said Secretary Wright issued emergency orders after a presidential national energy emergency declaration that "prevented the premature retirement of more than 17 gigawatts of reliable dispatchable generation" and that the department also "leveraged more than 35 gigawatts of backup power at data centers and other large industrial sites to stabilize the grid."
On generation mix, Fitzsimmons said, "85% of the power ... came from natural gas, coal, and nuclear, in that order." He and host Scott Jennings contrasted those dispatchable resources with intermittent renewables during the storm.
Fitzsimmons also cited a Department of Energy report he said showed the country was on track to lose 100 gigawatts of reliable capacity and that, under that trajectory, outages would have risen sharply: "that would have resulted in 100 times more power outages for the American people, not 100% more, 100 times more power outages by 2030," he said.
When Jennings asked whether new demands such as AI data centers change the risk picture, Fitzsimmons said restoring and preserving dispatchable capacity is central to the department's strategy of "stabilize, optimize, and grow" the energy system.
The interview did not include independent data or third-party responses to the projections and policy claims Fitzsimmons made. Fitzsimmons framed the department's actions as reversing what he called prior policies that reduced reserve margins and risked reliability. The segment ended with Fitzsimmons thanking the host and the show concluding.