Unless the rules changed within the last six years, if a hen house returns a positive environmental Salmonella Enteritidis test and the farm is large enough they must undergo an egg break test to show that the eggs themselves are not infected with SE before they can be sold to consumers. If the egg test is positive the eggs can only be sold as some form of pasteurized egg product until testing shows negative.
That would make it more expensive than onshore wind($45/MWh) and solar yet($48/MWh) cheaper than all other sources of energy including natural gas($59/MWh). Double the final cost of energy to $110/MWh and it would still be in theory cheaper than the average for coal($115/MWh). Granted I'm pulling these numbers from Wikipedia so it's not that simple but the numbers aren't unrealistic.
I don't know enough about importing capacity in that other grid since they're hooked up to the western half supposedly but I agree with your points. TX being hooked up to the rest of the US could have saved them and this other regional grid appears to be managing it better than TX.
Texas had blackouts due to extreme cold as recently as 2011. The findings from the investigation after that event were ignored and we are now seeing a repeat of it exactly 10 years later. It has not worked "just fine" for decades.
For the pedantic TX does have connections to other grids but the capacity is so low that it wouldn't have mitigated this event and is under whatever threshold is set for federal oversight.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC173326/
Unless the rules changed within the last six years, if a hen house returns a positive environmental Salmonella Enteritidis test and the farm is large enough they must undergo an egg break test to show that the eggs themselves are not infected with SE before they can be sold to consumers. If the egg test is positive the eggs can only be sold as some form of pasteurized egg product until testing shows negative.
Page 47 if you're bored. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2009-07-09/pdf/E9-161...