"Most Texan homes are not kitted out for arctic survival and apparently many homes were internally sub-zero if you did not own a log/gas fire."
It doesn't need weather stopping generation for this to be a problem. A local cable fault can have the same impact. We had an outage of about 15 hours at the beginning of December, That knocked out the central heating but we have gas fires and a gas hob so we could keep warm and prepare hot drinks and food. But as HMG policy is to ban dual fuel in new builds that's a problem stacking up for the future. However if it's a problem that only becomes serious in a future electoral cycle it doesn't matter as they can go into the next election waving their green credentials.