Getty Many Texans had issues finding gas after the winter storm.
Many parts of Texas, including Austin, are experiencing shortages at gas stations because of the winter storm. Here are some resources that may help you find gas stations open in your area of Austin, Texas, depending on where you live.
Try Gas Buddy
Gas Buddy is a gasoline availability tracker that works from crowdsourcing reports from other users. If you visit a station and find that it has fuel or it doesn’t have fuel, mark that online or in the app. You can use Gas Buddy online to track fuel availability here in a section called their Outage Tracker. You’ll need to enter your address, city, or ZIP code to search for gas stations open near your area. Each gas station notes not only if it’s open, but also if gas, electric, or diesel is available. The icons for each will have a red slash through them if someone who recently visited noticed those services weren’t available. ‘
You can also see a list of gas stations in Austin here. Each gas station also has a corresponding price for gas and what time it was last updated by a user.
You can find Dallas here, Houston here, Corpus Christi here, and San Antonio here.
Please note that a gas station listed here doesn’t mean it is guaranteed to have gas, but this is a good place to start. Gas Buddy does sometimes update slowly, so you might also try calling the gas stations that are listed as being open and have recent updates, just to be certain.
It has corresponding mobile apps here that you can also use.
For other cities, visit here and scroll down to “Major Areas.”
Try Online Communities
Another option is to check online communities near your region. Reddit’s regional subreddits are often great sources of information. Try these:
In addition, you should also join your local Nextdoor community and your local Ring Neighbors app if you have a Ring product. These are both good resources for connecting with neighbors in your region and determining what’s open and what’s not.
While there isn’t technically a gas shortage, many gas stations don’t currently have gas available because of power or temporary distribution issues. This shouldn’t be a long-lasting issue, but if you need gas right away, the resources above might be able to help.
ERCOT Said Texas Was Seconds Away from a Months-Long Blackout
Officials with ERCOT have said that Texas’ power grid was only minutes or even seconds away from failing entirely and leaving the state in a blackout that could have lasted months, KWTX reported.
Bill Magness, president of ERCOT, said: “It was seconds and minutes [from possible failure] given the amount of generation that was coming off the system.”
Operators started rolling blackouts that ended up being much longer due to energy dropping off the grid after natural gas plants, wind power, and coal plants all went offline from the winter storm. Demand increased simultaneously.
NBC DFW reported that ERCOT also didn’t conduct on-site inspections of state power plants this year to prepare for the winter months because of the pandemic, but hosted tabletop virtual exercises instead with just 16% of power facilities.
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