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What do you mean "going black"? That's not a technical term any grid operator uses.

They have various conservation strategies to manage peak demand if it exceeds capacity, like asking for voluntary conservation and/or rolling blackouts in extreme cases, but every grid operator does contingency planning like this. The Texas grid handled historic demand levels over the summer just fine.

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Generally blackouts are controlled somewhat and can be caused by protective circuits to ensure generators stay online when the load becomes too great for the generation. In Texas, the blackouts were so vast and the generation sources were absolutely not prepped for cold weather, so there were questions as to whether they would have enough generation on certain circuits to bring the grid online in days rather than the horrible scenario of a black start for large swaths of the Texas grid, which could have taken weeks or months. Going black is the term I’ve heard used in my industry circles for the grid requiring a black start.

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