Power outages in US and Canada

[epicstruggle]

I plan on writing my senators, representatives, and governor asking for:
-a more modernized electrical grid system
-replace aging power plants with the new nuclear plants
-ability to separate ourselves from other states/countries.

we need to upgrade and replace the aging system. I hope we dont get into the stupid debate of who is to blame and instead come up with a plan on preventing such a blackout from ever happening again.

later,

 

[jvd]

well i jsut got power back. Yesterday afternoon i was down by the hudson . In a small town called edgewater. We normaly go there for bbqs and just to chill. There are parks from the 1800s along with cabins and old cannons that washington left behind . It gives a perfect view of the city. Well lets just say when the city went dark we did not enjoy ourselfs. It was one of the scariest moments of my life. I rushed back on my normaly 20 min drive back home. It took almost 3 hours . Then i went and bought ice and meat to cook on the grill. Well i never got to cooking. I ended up down the street directing traffic till 4 am .

We need to fix this grid. I wasn't born the last two times this happened but we def need this fixed.

 

[Natoma]

My mom says I was born in that '77 blackout and subsequent brownout. July 23rd 1977. hehe. Sooooo, I was alive.

 

[L233]

I always get a nice chuckle out of people bitching about the evils of the power companies...how prices are too high...they cause cancer...we don't need to spend money upgrading grid technology.....save the 5 assed monkey and don't build a power line here!

Yeah, like there wasn't more than enough space in the US to build high voltage overland line somewhere where no one feels bothered by them...

And obviously the prices aren't high enough or the power companies wouldn't have let the grid rot to that pittyful condition to cut costs. The glories of market liberalisation. The magic hand of the free market. <wave flag here>

What really surprised me was the lack of back up systems in the subway system. People locked up in subways without light and no announcement what's giong on? Don't they have UPS and backup generators? Weren't there also some hospitals without backup power?


Oh, and Natoma (from another thread):

What's sad is that the power grids in Europe are generally too old and outdated to be able to support mass AC use even if they wanted to.

Not so.

 

[micron]

Ive been without power for almost 24 hours. Power came on about 40 minutes ago.

And you logged right back on to B3D!......now thats dedication

 

[DemoCoder]

Yeah, like there wasn't more than enough space in the US to build high voltage overland line somewhere where no one feels bothered by them...

Ask the environmentalists.

And obviously the prices aren't high enough or the power companies wouldn't have let the grid rot to that pittyful condition to cut costs. The glories of market liberalisation. The magic hand of the free market. <wave flag here>

Well it seems you don't know what you're talking about. The power companies in market liberated areas are no longer responsible for maintaining the grid. That responsibility falls to ISOs, independent system operators, usually government sanctioned, regulated, and often funded monopolies.

The car companies aren't required to build the highways, Amazon doesn't have to build internet backbones, why should the power companies be required to build the power lines? Power generation is separate from delivery infrastructure. These two were rightfully separated. Same thing should happen for rail travel as well.

If the grid isn't properly being invested in, it isn't the power companies' fault, it is the ISOs, and ergo, the state legislature's failure.


The so called "market liberalization" you talk about, e.g. the California RE-REGULATION did not uncuff the invisible hand of the market. In real markets, buyers and suppliers are able to enter into long term contracts, or use derivatives to hedge against price fluctuations and lock in price ranges. In California, the power suppliers (generating companies) were unable to do either of these by law, hence, PGE had to buy power at whatever the spot market price was. Enron of course took advantage of PGE's position. Imagine if you had to, by law, by an airline ticket only on the day of travel, and if there were not enough coach seats, you were forced to buy first class.

Moreover, PGE could not pass on any increases in power supply price to the end user freely. Environmentalists want people to conserve power, but they cry whenever there is talk about letting the electricity rate float according to supply and demand. (Power should be more expensive during summer!)


What really surprised me was the lack of back up systems in the subway system. People locked up in subways without light and no announcement what's giong on? Don't they have UPS and backup generators? Weren't there also some hospitals without backup power?

Oh, and Natoma (from another thread):

What's sad is that the power grids in Europe are generally too old and outdated to be able to support mass AC use even if they wanted to.

Not so.

[/quote]

Then why is France melting down?

 

[zurich]

Regardless of finger pointing, this is still pretty sad. Canada's power grid is "ok", Quebec's is totally segregated from the rest of the country (there were pictures of Ottawa in darkness with Hull litup across the river - reason #1289024 to hate the Quebecqouis) so they weren't affected, but from what I understand the US grid carries most of the blame. It sure is easier to update something like this in a country of 30 mil, let alone 275+ mil, but if Bush is really determined to get a 'fortress America' thing going.. well, obviously missile defence systems don't mean jack in situations like these

I think this is just a problem no one wants to touch with a ten foot poll, sadly :? We (Canadians) were promised this would 'never happen again' in 1965.. well, woops!

 

[Doomtrooper]

Finger pointing is silly, imagine the amount of power required to run NYC and Toronto, Chicago...three VERY large cities. The people are not at fault, it is hot here 32 Degree excluding humidity and air conditioners are roaring away.
Watching the news here, the Niagra region was already at Max Capacity, the entire reason why it happened is that one large power station went down from the draw, which then sends the load to next...and them the Domino effect.

The reason we are tied together (US and Canada) is we provide alot of water powered Hydro Electricity to NY State, we are in fact neighbors you know .
I agree a modern system to allow smaller grids to go down is neccessary, but the MAIN problem is we need MORE power during these heat waves, as the earth is only getting hotter.

The Pickering Nuclear station is only running at 40% capacity and is due to go online 100% at the end of the year after upgrades, that will help..but more stations are needed.
We are talking a highly populated area here.

 

[epicstruggle]

Ive been without power for almost 24 hours. Power came on about 40 minutes ago.

And you logged right back on to B3D!......now thats dedication

First thing I did was scan my hard drives for damage. After assesing that no damage was caused, B3D was the first thing I did. After reading a few threads went to cnn. And then I turned on the AC.

later,

 

[DemoCoder]

The power grid needs to be more decentralized, and work more like the internet. Anyone should be able to be a power supplier. If I put a micro-turbine in my building, or have my own solar panels or windmills, I should be able to sell surplus power back into the grid.

In fact, a distributed market-based grid would help ameliorate much of the problems with the nutty green policies. That is, for example, if it is foggy in San Francisco, people with solar power in San Jose or San Ramone can sell them power. If it is windy Tracy, wind generators can sell to Livermore. Decentralization is insurance against local flucuations.

 

[epicstruggle]

The power grid needs to be more decentralized, and work more like the internet. Anyone should be able to be a power supplier. If I put a micro-turbine in my building, or have my own solar panels or windmills, I should be able to sell surplus power back into the grid.

Actually there are laws in the books that require the power companies to buy any excess power you might generate. If i had a solar panel, or energy produced by wind I could sell the excess to the power company and they would be required to buy it.

later,
epic

 

[diarrhea_splatter]

I plan on writing my senators, representatives, and governor asking for:
-a more modernized electrical grid system
-replace aging power plants with the new nuclear plants
-ability to separate ourselves from other states/countries.

we need to upgrade and replace the aging system. I hope we dont get into the stupid debate of who is to blame and instead come up with a plan on preventing such a blackout from ever happening again.

later,

Just make sure you say you don't want them to federalize the power companies, otherwise Big Brother will make sure we all know who's in control if something like this happens again.

 

[diarrhea_splatter]

but if Bush is really determined to get a 'fortress America' thing going

We need to sure up our borders first...don't see that will happen any time soon.

 

[zurich]

Finger pointing is silly, imagine the amount of power required to run NYC and Toronto, Chicago...three VERY large cities. The people are not at fault, it is hot here 32 Degree excluding humidity and air conditioners are roaring away.
Watching the news here, the Niagra region was already at Max Capacity, the entire reason why it happened is that one large power station went down from the draw, which then sends the load to next...and them the Domino effect.

The reason we are tied together (US and Canada) is we provide alot of water powered Hydro Electricity to NY State, we are in fact neighbors you know .
I agree a modern system to allow smaller grids to go down is neccessary, but the MAIN problem is we need MORE power during these heat waves, as the earth is only getting hotter.

The Pickering Nuclear station is only running at 40% capacity and is due to go online 100% at the end of the year after upgrades, that will help..but more stations are needed.
We are talking a highly populated area here.

I'm criticising our grid (our being North America's in general) system. I agree with DemoCoder, a decentralized setup would be very cool

I wonder what the actual, true price tag is for 21st century-itizing the power grid, in total? *thinks 9 digits*

 

[Deepak]

Why can't we(MNCs) invest a few millions and design an AC that consumes less power....not as if it is forbidden by some Newton law....I can't understand!

 

[Saem]

The first thing you'd have to is likely swtich to a higher voltage, say 220, instead of the 110 we're running at now, that should be a modest improvement. The other thing to do is make out distribution systems more parrallel and decentralise the power generation sources. The latter will likely move the power generation sources closer to the consumption sources and thus less power will be lost. It'd be nice if new houses were merely legislated to have solar panels installed on the rooves in sunny areas, same with high rise buildings. This could help decrease power consumption durning the long sunny summer days.

The problem is to generate more power you need more generation stations which don't come cheap to the environment. There is a balance, the question is which way to swing.

Additionally, I remember hearing about a study done some 15 or so years ago in Europe that was buried by power companies which showed that higher power lines and cancer are related.

I think you'd have to be pretty dumb to think those have no effect on people -- the question is what effect. I think there are enough cancer hot spots near high power lines that makes me side with caution. Besides, I don't think ultra high power lines are a huge problem, it's more the poor urban/city planning.

 

[pcchen]

It shouldn't be hard to find the relationship between power lines and cancer, since there are many high voltage power lines. Power companies won't be able to stop all such research.

However, even if power lines are possible cause of cancer, it shouldn't be the reason to stop building power lines. What should be done is proper protection. For example, fire is dangerous. Should there be law to prohibit all use of fire? That would be rediculous.

There are many ways to protect people from the power lines. If people are concerned about EM field/waves, we can use protected wires, or calculate a proper height for the towers (to make a larger distance). If the EM field/waves from the power line are considerable smaller than a TV, it shouldn't be a major concern.

 

[Fred]

I just got power back last night late. What a nightmare.

Anyway, the reason for the problem is known (I can't go into too much details as its a colleague and about 10 others who are writing up the paper and proposed solutions as we speak). Scientists at the power companies warned of this several months ago, and were promptly ignored.

Theres actually multiple reasons for the extent of the problem, a hierarchy of failsafes that failed. Either way, the conspiracy theories out there are all wrong.

Very embarassing actually, many people are going to lose their jobs over this.

 

[epicstruggle]

@Fred: Many people in the news have been saying that the failsafes did fail. The only thing that saved us from a MUCH bigger blackout was the failsafes in philadalphia, midatlantic, and one in the midwest. Had any of these also failed the problem could have been quite huge. Is there any way you can confirm the above information is true? much appreciated.

later,
epic

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Here's one account of the events:

http://www.msnbc.com/news/953366.asp?0cv=CB10

In somes ways, I like to look at this from the opposite perspective:

The grid itself might not be "modern enough" to prevent the wide outage, but the "fail-safe" systems for taking power plants off line...to avoid some major long term cataostrophy (either to equipment or the environment, or both)...all seemed to work just fine.

At the end of the day, we ended up with about 24 hours of inconvenience. And thats one very-wide outage in what...25 years? (The last similar one was '77 IIRC.)

Not that anyone wants to go through this again, but that's not too shabby a record....