Governor Greg Abbott announced a $200 million Texas Energy Fund (TxEF) grant aimed at reinforcing grid resiliency and reliability for more than 538,000 Entergy Texas customers.
According to a June 15 press release from the Governor’s Office, the funding will directly support infrastructure upgrades to better insulate the region’s power grid from flooding and severe weather events.
The award is distributed through the TxEF Outside-ERCOT Grant Program, an initiative overseen by the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) to fund grid improvements for residents located outside the state’s primary electrical grid region.
PUCT Chairman Thomas Gleeson noted that the allocation delivers on the exact types of infrastructure investments Texas voters approved when they established the TxEF. Entergy Texas CEO Eliecer Viamontes praised the state partnership, emphasizing that fast-tracking these grid upgrades will result in “zero impact to customer bills.”
The $200 million grant is split across two primary resilience projects spanning portions of Chambers, Grimes, Hardin, Jefferson, Liberty, Montgomery, Orange, and Walker counties.
The first and larger project focuses on strengthening more than 400 miles of transmission and distribution lines while upgrading over 9,000 physical structures, including utility poles vulnerable to high winds, to reduce storm-related outages and cut restoration times.
The second initiative will systematically fortify five regional substations against flooding and severe weather to ensure they remain fully operational during extreme weather events.