He could depend on the 16 solar panels mounted in his backyard and a battery system to provide for the basic needs of his house in the suburban community of Hilshire Village.

He was one of the people I reached out to this week to get a sense of whether Beryl, along with longer-term concerns about the reliability of the grid, have made Texans more receptive to rooftop solar.

Such customer-owned resources are an essential part of the shift away from fossil fuels, helping to reduce demand on a grid that relies on natural gas power plants to produce electricity.

How much room is difficult to say, but a good way to frame it is that the state’s generation from small-scale solar last year was equivalent to about 1% of the total from large power plants.

Some of the main drivers of rooftop solar in Texas have been a desire to reduce exposure to rising utility costs and concerns about reliability of the grid, said Ryan Barnett, senior vice president of policy and market development for Palmetto, a North Carolina-based climate tech company whose products include solar and battery storage.

Disclosure: CenterPoint Energy has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors.

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