Oil and gas companies in Texas were restarting operations on Tuesday after Hurricane Beryl lashed the state with 80-mph winds, damaging property and leaving millions of people without power.
Beryl made landfall early on Monday near the coastal town of Matagorda. Some energy firms had shut operations ahead of its arrival, and Texas’ largest ports and navigation channels were closed. However, the impact on oil and gas production is expected to be minor.
On Tuesday, ports were set to reopen, and some producers and facilities were ramping up output after preventively cutting down processing. Some were limited by the slow restoration of power to homes, businesses, and industrial customers.
About 2.2 million customers remained without power in Texas early on Tuesday, according to PowerOutage.us, including some 1.8 million served by the state’s largest provider, CenterPoint Energy. The figure was more than double the number of customers that lost power in May when a weather event bringing strong winds hit Houston. It took more than a week for those outages to be resolved in some city neighborhoods.
CenterPoint, which said the hurricane resulted in “widespread power outages,” warned customers that the power interruptions might last for several days due to the severity of the storm.
Despite the widespread power outages, the Texas oil and gas sector appears to be recovering quickly from the disruption caused by Hurricane Beryl. The industry’s ability to rapidly restore operations is a testament to its resilience and preparedness in the face of extreme weather events.