Winter Storms, Summer Heat, and our 3rd World Electric System

horninchicago said:
Man, you should really consider the proper placement of commas, especially with him.
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lol-hey.gif
 
We had a couple of wrapped outside pipes bust and have already fixed them. a pipe in the wall between the kitchen and Living room burst. Not good, deductible is going to be several thousand $ more than to fix I think. We live in Houston and seem to handle hurricanes much better than a freeze.
 
EDT,

I have a great plumber that I've used for years. Safe, efficient, independent and less than big firms. PM me if you want info
 
Because we ALL know a US Senator could have and should have restored the power
As we see U.S. senators are doing all over the Midwest and north coast are doing now.
 
Overarching issue:

Our population has grown by a lot.
Our electric generation and grid/distribution system has lagged behind, has not kept up with the population growth, and does not seem to have modernized much.

It’s a problem here in Texas, and throughout much of the Nation.
 
Chop said:
Overarching issue:

Our population has grown by a lot.
Our electric generation and grid/distribution system has lagged behind, has not kept up with the population growth, and does not seem to have modernized much.

It’s a problem here in Texas, and throughout much of the Nation.
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And the investments that have been made in the grid have been in unreliable "green" energy.
 
If we could cover the entire Great Plains with wind turbines, we just might be able to solve these problems.
 
Point of irony—

if things get bad enough for the Euros this winter, millions may revert back 100+ years to burning wood for their heat. That’s MUCH dirtier for the air than coal and petroleum—based fuel plants.
 
How about this—

Build a bunch of coal and natural gas plants just over the Rio Grande in Mexico (presumably with little regulation, or with the sort of regulators who can be convinced in classic Mexico govt official style), and import the cheap electricity.
 
Ha! The Cartels could move into the electric generation business. I couldn’t fathom anything possibly going wrong with that.
 
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Chop said:
How about this—

Build a bunch of coal and natural gas plants just over the Rio Grande in Mexico (presumably with little regulation, or with the sort of regulators who can be convinced in classic Mexico govt official style), and import the cheap electricity.
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Pollution from Mexico already hurts development in the Southwest US thanks to the USAAQ regs.
 
Chop said:
Our population has grown by a lot.
Our electric generation and grid/distribution system has lagged behind, has not kept up with the population growth, and does not seem to have modernized much.
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The only real issue is that production hasn't kept up with population and demand growth. Combined with that is most of the supply growth has been wind and solar which is intermittent.

Modernization isn't really a thing. Cables, transformers, switchgear, and connections are repaired and replaced when they need to be. But these electrical components can have lifetimes to 100 years. Transformers themselves have to last at least 20 years by regulation. The industry has purposefully dumbed the reliability and performance of these component to save money. But they still work well if the parts are well made.

Modernization is code name for adding more wind and solar. There are things you have to do to condition the electricity when you get to high %s of wind and solar. You also have to manage load better because the sources are so unreliable.

We are at the beginning of some real modernization though with automating more of the grid. Right now it is very manual and analog. Just like we now have smart phones and smart TVs. We are working on a smart grid. It should help fault detection, response times, and prevention of problems through more proactive action. Of course being proactive costs more money so how proactive will these companies really be.
 
Wind and Solar vary a lot from hour to hour much less day to day, so posting a particular single-moment snapshot when it's low (or when it's high) is about as meaningless as using a single high or low temperature in a single location to prove or disprove climate changes that take decades or centuries to unfold.

Note last time, it was subfreezing from Sunday afternoon till Saturday noon.
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Also, it was in late February, so we'd already taken some large plants down for routine maintenance - and you can't exactly just instantly switch them back on. For hopefully obvious reasons, they try to avoid doing this sort of maintenance in mid December....
 
Statalyzer said:
Wind and Solar vary a lot from hour to hour much less day to day, so posting a particular single-moment snapshot when it's low (or when it's high) is about as meaningless as using a single high or low temperature in a single location to prove or disprove climate changes that take decades or centuries to unfold.
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Incorrect. It shows a very important point. When you really need power you can't rely on wind and solar. If it is 0F and you only have wind and solar electricity you are going to die.
 
Monahorns said:
Incorrect. It shows a very important point. When you really need power you can't rely on wind and solar. If it is 0F and you only have wind and solar electricity you are going to die.
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Apparently transforming into a human popsicle over night isn’t worthy analysis.
 
I know there were some localized outages due to high winds and equipment failure but overall the grid seems to have held. Of course more freezing weather will come.
Other states had problems.
 
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