Texas launches new investigation into Houston's power utility following deadly outages after Beryl

zooming in

Texas' attorney general launched an investigation Monday into Houston's electric utility over allegations of fraud and waste following Hurricane Beryl, adding to the mounting scrutiny after widespread power outages left millions without electricity for days.

The latest investigation of CenterPoint Energy comes after state regulators and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott have also demanded answers about storm preparations and the response to Beryl, a Category 1 hurricane that knocked out power to nearly 3 million people around the nation’s fourth-largest city.

The storm was blamed for at least three dozen deaths, including those of some residents who died in homes that were left without air conditioning in sweltering heat after the storm's passage.

“My office is aware of concerning allegations regarding CenterPoint and how its conduct affected readiness during Hurricane Beryl,” Ken Paxton, the state's Republican attorney general, said in a statement. “If the investigation uncovers unlawful activity, that activity will be met with the full force of the law.”

The utility pledged its support of the investigation.

“We look forward to cooperating with the Texas Attorney General or any other agency and have made clear our commitment to upholding the values of our company,” CenterPoint spokesperson John Sousa said.

Paxton did not cite any specific allegations of waste or fraud in his announcement and his office did not respond to requests for comment.

Abbott has demanded answers from CenterPoint for what he called its slow restoration efforts and poor communication with customers in the days leading up to the storm. The state's Public Utility Commission has launched its own investigation, and lawmakers grilled the company’s top executive over its failures at a hearing last month.

CenterPoint has largely defended its storm preparedness and said that it deployed thousands of additional workers to help restore power. The utility provider has also begun a monthslong plan to replace hundreds of wooden utility poles and double its tree-trimming efforts after the governor pressed for swift action.

Beryl damaged power lines and uprooted trees when it made its Texas landfall on July 8. It’s the latest natural disaster to hit Houston after a powerful storm ripped through the area in May, leaving nearly 1 million people without power.

Many residents fear that chronic outages have become the norm after Texas’ power grid failed amid a deadly winter storm in 2021.

CenterPoint has previously faced questions over the reliability of Houston's power grid.

In 2008, Hurricane Ike, a Category 2 storm, knocked out power to more than 2 people million and it took 19 days to fully restore electricity. The city of Houston created a task force initiative to investigate the company's response and determined it needed to automate parts of its grid to minimize outages.

CenterPoint received millions of dollars in federal funding to implement this technology years ago. However, according to executive vice president Jason Ryan, it's still a work in progress.

Some utility experts and critics say the company hasn’t adapted its technology fast enough to meet the extreme weather conditions Texas will continue to face.

From Your Site Articles

It will take days to recover from Hurricane Beryl. Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Houston residents face high temperatures after storm Beryl leaves millions without power

lights out

The return of searing heat in the Houston area has deepened the misery for people still without power after Hurricane Beryl left residents in search of places to cool off and fuel up as the extended outages strained one of the nation’s largest cities.

More than 1.7 million homes and businesses in Texas lacked electricity Wednesday morning, down from a peak of over 2.7 million on Monday, according to PowerOutage.us. State officials faced questions over whether the power utility that covers much of the area had sufficiently prepared.

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said that a sports and event complex would be used to temporarily hold up to 250 hospital patients who are awaiting discharge but cannot be released to homes with no power.

Beryl, which made landfall in Texas early Monday as a Category 1 hurricane, has been blamed for at least seven U.S. deaths — one in Louisiana and six in Texas — and at least 11 in the Caribbean. It weakened as it moved deeper into the U.S. and early Wednesday was a post-tropical cyclone centered over northeastern Indiana.

A flood watch was in effect for parts of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. The storm spawned suspected tornadoes in parts of Indiana and Kentucky.

In the Houston area, Beryl compounded and repeated the misery of May, when storms killed eight people and left nearly 1 million without power.

High temperatures Tuesday climbed into the 90s (above 32.2 Celsius) with humidity that made it feel even hotter. Similar heat and humidity were expected Wednesday. The National Weather Service described the conditions as potentially dangerous, given the lack of power and air conditioning.

People coped as best they could. Kyuta Allen took her family to a Houston community center to cool down and use the internet.

“During the day you can have the doors open, but at night you’ve got to board up and lock up — lock yourself like into a sauna,” she said.

An executive for CenterPoint Energy, which covers much of the Houston area, defended the utility’s preparation and response.

“From my perspective, to have a storm pass at 3 p.m. in the afternoon, have those crews come in in the late evening, and have everything ready by 5 a.m. to go out and get out and start the workforce is rather impressive, because we’re talking about thousands of crews,” said Brad Tutunjian, vice president of regulatory policy.

Nim Kidd, head of the state’s division of emergency management, stressed that restoring power was the top priority.

Patrick, who is acting as governor while Gov. Greg Abbott is overseas, said nursing homes and assisted living centers were the highest priority. Sixteen hospitals ran on generator power Tuesday morning, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Ad Placement 300x100

Ad Placement 300x600

CultureMap Emails are Awesome

Property Showcase

Investment bank opens energy-focused office in Houston

new to hou

Investment bank Cohen & Co. Capital Markets has opened a Houston office to serve as the hub of its energy advisory business and has tapped investment banking veteran Rahul Jasuja as the office’s leader.

Jasuja joined Cohen & Co. Capital Markets, a subsidiary of financial services company Cohen & Co., as managing director, and head of energy and energy transition investment banking. Cohen’s capital markets arm closed $44 billion worth of deals last year.

Jasuja previously worked at energy-focused Houston investment bank Mast Capital Advisors, where he was managing director of investment banking. Before Mast Capital, Jasuja was director of energy investment banking in the Houston office of Wells Fargo Securities.

“Meeting rising [energy] demand will require disciplined capital allocation across traditional energy, sustainable fuels, and firm, dispatchable solutions such as nuclear and geothermal,” Jasuja said in a news release. “Houston remains the center of gravity where capital, operating expertise, and execution come together to make that transition investable.”

The Houston office will focus on four energy verticals:

Energy systems such as nuclear and geothermal
Energy supply chains
Energy-transition fuel and technology
Traditional energy

“We are making a committed investment in Houston because we believe the infrastructure powering AI, defense, and energy transition — from nuclear to rare-earth technology — represents the next secular cycle of value creation,” Jerry Serowik, head of Cohen & Co. Capital Markets, added in the release.

Houston cleantech startup Helix Earth lands $1.2M NSF grant

federal funding

Renewable equipment manufacturer Helix Earth Technologies is one of three Houston-based companies to secure federal funding through the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II grant program in recent months.

The company—which was founded based on NASA technology, spun out of Rice University and has been incubated at Greentown Labs—has received approximately $1.2 million from the National Science Foundation to develop its high-efficiency retrofit dehumidification systems that aim to reduce the energy consumption of commercial AC units. The company reports that its technology has the potential to cut AC energy use by up to 50 percent.

"This award validates our vision and propels our impact forward with valuable research funding and the prestige of the NSF stamp of approval," Rawand Rasheed, Helix CEO and founder, shared in a LinkedIn post. "This award is a reflection our exceptional team's grit, expertise, and collaborative spirit ... This is just the beginning as we continue pushing for a sustainable future."

Two other Houston-area companies also landed $1.2 million in NSF SBIR Phase II funding during the same period:

Resilitix Intelligence, a disaster AI startup that was founded shortly after Hurricane Harvey, that works to "reduce the human and economic toll of disasters" by providing local and state organizations and emergency response teams with near-real-time, AI-driven insights to improve response speed, save lives and accelerate recovery
Conroe-based Fluxworks Inc., founded in 2021 at Texas A&M, which provides magnetic gear technology for the space industry that has the potential to significantly enhance in-space manufacturing and unlock new capabilities for industries by allowing advanced research and manufacturing in microgravity

The three grants officially rolled out in early September 2025 and are expected to run through August 2027, according to the NSF. The SBIR Phase II grants support in-depth research and development of ideas that showed potential for commercialization after receiving Phase I grants from government agencies.

However, congressional authority for the program, often called "America's seed fund," expired on September 30, 2025, and has stalled since the recent government shutdown. Government agencies cannot issue new grants until Congress agrees on a path forward. According to SBIR.gov, "if no further action is taken by Congress, federal agencies may not be able to award funding under SBIR/STTR programs and SBIR/STTR solicitations may be delayed, cancelled, or rescinded."

Mars Materials makes breakthrough in clean carbon fiber production

Future of Fiber

Houston-based Mars Materials has made a breakthrough in turning stored carbon dioxide into everyday products.

In partnership with the Textile Innovation Engine of North Carolina and North Carolina State University, Mars Materials turned its CO2-derived product into a high-quality raw material for producing carbon fiber, according to a news release. According to the company, the product works "exactly like" the traditional chemical used to create carbon fiber that is derived from oil and coal.

Testing showed the end product met the high standards required for high-performance carbon fiber. Carbon fiber finds its way into aircraft, missile components, drones, racecars, golf clubs, snowboards, bridges, X-ray equipment, prosthetics, wind turbine blades and more.

The successful test “keeps a promise we made to our investors and the industry,” Aaron Fitzgerald, co-founder and CEO of Mars Materials, said in the release. “We proved we can make carbon fiber from the air without losing any quality.”

“Just as we did with our water-soluble polymers, getting it right on the first try allows us to move faster,” Fitzgerald adds. “We can now focus on scaling up production to accelerate bringing manufacturing of this critical material back to the U.S.”

Mars Materials, founded in 2019, converts captured carbon into resources, such as carbon fiber and wastewater treatment chemicals. Investors include Untapped Capital, Prithvi Ventures, Climate Capital Collective, Overlap Holdings, BlackTech Capital, Jonathan Azoff, Nate Salpeter and Brian Andrés Helmick.

View All Listings

ENERGYCAPITALHTX EMAILS ARE AWESOME