Abstract: Due to the extreme cold weather, a rotating power outage event occurred in Texas, USA, from February 15 to February 19, 2021, affecting more than 4.5 million residents. The Texas power grid entered the Level 3 emergency operation, with a maximum load shaving reaching 20000 MW, and the maximum real-time price surpassing 9000$(MW·h). According to published reports of Energy Reliability Council of Texas, this paper sorts out the outage process. Based on a proposed analysis structure of power outage, this paper analyses the outage causes and summarizes the implications for the power sector of China. It is proposed that we should bring into full play of the advantages of the "three-unified"(unified planning, unified dispatching and unified management)power system in China, pay attention to emergency power supply security in extreme scenarios, build a diversified supply system suitable for China’s future power system characterized with "double-high" (high-penetration of renewable energy and high-proportion of power electronics equipment), strengthen the physical basis for power security, and explore a electricity market model with Chinese characteristics.

Key words: Texas, extreme cold weather, rotating outage, power grid, accident analysis