State oil and gas inspectors are not adequately verifying that Texas natural gas production and delivery systems are prepared to keep running in severe winter storms. Regulators have also failed to hold natural gas operators to winter weatherization standards, according to from the State Auditor's Office.
The state mandate requiring natural gas production and distribution companies to prepare for extreme winter weather goes back to the 2021 blackouts during Winter Storm Uri.
Those blackouts are largely remembered as a failure of the Texas electric grid. But the days-long power outage was also caused by freeze-related breakdowns along Texas’s vast natural gas supply chain. Those problems stopped gas from reaching power plants, contributing to the electricity crunch.
Afrom the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission found that more than 30% of power plant failures during the storm were due to interruptions in fuel supply, almost all of it natural gas.
After the blackouts, the state legislature passed Senate Bill 3. Among other things, the law requires the Railroad Commission to identify the parts of the gas supply chain that are critical to the operation of the Texas power grid, and ensure those parts are ready to run during severe winter weather.
The Railroad Commission, the state’s oil and gas regulatory agency, began on-site inspections of natural gas wells, pipelines and storage facilities to gauge their winter preparedness in December 2022.
The agency has of the program in ensuring an adequate winter gas supply. But the recent audit found significant shortcomings.
No ‘best practices�
According to the auditor’s report, current rules allow gas companies to decide for themselves what constitutes sufficient winter preparedness for their own operations. Every company that did anything to prepare for winter weather appears to have passed inspection.
Of the 8,732 inspections the Railroad Commission conducted during the 2024 and 2025 winter seasons, regulators issued only two violations. Both of those were because the facilities inspected “had no weatherization methods in place,� according to the audit.
“The Commission stated that it relies on facility operators to determine which weatherization measures are needed and whether those measures are sufficient for that facility,� auditors found. “It did not compare facilities� actual weatherization methods to the Commission’s best practices.�
When facilities passed inspection, the Commission did not follow up with suggestions for improvement.
“The commission did not identify and communicate to facilities any weaknesses in weatherization in the other 8,730 inspections [that passed],� reported auditors.
Taking industries word for it
Staff at critical gas facilities are required to attend weather preparedness training to be ready in the event of severe storms. The audit found that inspectors are not required to verify that trainings actually took place and, instead, take the gas companies� word for it.
“Not verifying training records increases the risk that some staff will not be prepared for severe winter weather events,� concluded state auditors.
Auditors said some of these shortcomings should be addressed with a “high� level of urgency because “prompt action is essential to address the noted concerns and reduce risk.�
The Railroad Commission and its critics respond
Critics of the Railroad Commission said the audit’s findings fit a larger pattern of lax oversight of the oil and gas industry.
"You could have [gas] operators doing the cheapest thing possible on site [to prepare for winter], and the cheapest thing possible might not be the most effective thing,� Virginia Palacio executive director of the watchdog group Commission Shift said about the current weatherization system.
But the Railroad Commission defended its record.
In a written response to the audit submitted by Railroad Commission Executive Director Wei Wang, the Commission disagreed with some of the audit's findings.
For one, the Commission contends that holding gas operators to industry best practices for weatherization is “unworkable� given the variety of locations inspectors need to visit.
During a site visit, “commission inspectors use their industry knowledge and extensive training to render a professional judgement,� the commission said.
The commission also bristled at the implication that the small number of violations detected by inspectors suggests a broken system of regulation.
“The low number of violations issued reflected the successful implementation of [Senate Bill] 3, not a failure of oversight,� wrote Commission management.
In regard to some of the other audit recommendations, the Commission agreed it should begin supplying companies with inspection records as a matter of practice, but said it would not try to verify whether staff had attended safety training unless it suspected company representatives of lying about it.
In a follow-up to the Railroad Commission’s response, state auditors stood by their findings.
