Spokesman for ERCOT, agency that controls Texas electrical grid, tonight said they had instituted rolling blackouts to prevent a catastrophic failure that would be caused by demand exceeding supply. Such a failure they said would require weeks maybe months to restore the system.

Any engineers or electrical folks here? What are they talking about? Do generators explode? Power lines melt? Transformers catch fire? The spokesman implied widespread physical damage.

Seems to me like the voltages would drop and lights dim. Could see damaging household appliances, but don’t understand basics of electrical system I guess.

So what do they mean?

When electrical demand starts outpacing electrical supply, volts drop and then amps start increasing and so does heat across the power lines. This can start creating a lot of heat in wires and melting them, melting other components such as transformers and so forth. Aside from also hurting household appliances.

^^ Substations and your neighborhood transformers have circuit breakers to prevent this.

CYA talk from ERCOT. They screwed the pooch and are trying to blow a lot of smoke up a lot of butts.
And these aren't rolling blackouts. Our power went out before 6 Monday night. Other than a very few 20 to 30 minute patches (4 so far) it's been off ever since.

quote:

Originally posted by XinTX:
CYA talk from ERCOT. They screwed the pooch and are trying to blow a lot of smoke up a lot of butts.

Just like Xcel out here, they stupidly placed their trust and the lives of their customers in shitty wind turbine bullshit.

I agree Tx screwed up on this, but wind turbines in SD don’t freeze every winter. Failure to build infrastructure to withstand foreseeable weather conditions is the root cause of this problem.

quote:

Originally posted by Skins2881:
^^ Substations and your neighborhood transformers have circuit breakers to prevent this.

It's surprising how many in the electrical field don't believe in circuit breakers doing there job and protecting equipment from damage.

Had a utility company say the lugs on a panel would melt if they installed too large of transformer/feeder line.

quote:

Originally posted by barndg00:
I agree Tx screwed up on this, but wind turbines in SD don’t freeze every winter. Failure to build infrastructure to withstand foreseeable weather conditions is the root cause of this problem.

Am I correct in assuming that the wind turbines in TX don't have any built in defrosting capabilities? Who's the dumbass that made that decision?

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:

quote:

Originally posted by barndg00:
I agree Tx screwed up on this, but wind turbines in SD don’t freeze every winter. Failure to build infrastructure to withstand foreseeable weather conditions is the root cause of this problem.

Am I correct in assuming that the wind turbines in TX don't have any built in defrosting capabilities? Who's the dumbass that made that decision?

7% of TX power comes from wind. Turbines have little to do with it

ERCOT predicted (incorrectly) and bought a supply of natural gas. The demand currently is 2/3 of what a normal hot August day is. They also took some of the generators off line

https://www.texastribune.org/2...sPRw0otERu6CDI5-rLKY

quote:

Originally posted by Skins2881:
^^ Substations and your neighborhood transformers have circuit breakers to prevent this.

Yes and no . Not that simple .

quote:

Originally posted by barndg00:
I agree Tx screwed up on this, but wind turbines in SD don’t freeze every winter. Failure to build infrastructure to withstand foreseeable weather conditions is the root cause of this problem.

That’s the general consensus now. Fuckers were warned in 2011 by the Feds that their shit was inadequate. They did not listen.

https://www.houstonchronicle.c...er-cold-15955392.php

quote:

Originally posted by Prefontaine:

quote:

Originally posted by barndg00:
I agree Tx screwed up on this, but wind turbines in SD don’t freeze every winter. Failure to build infrastructure to withstand foreseeable weather conditions is the root cause of this problem.

That’s the general consensus now. Fuckers were warned in 2011 by the Feds that their shit was inadequate. They did not listen.

https://www.houstonchronicle.c...er-cold-15955392.php

And it seems no one in Texas government was holding their feet to the fire on it. I know Republicans are the party of less gov intrusion, but when it comes to critical infrastructure like electricity maybe they should be a little more involved in ensuring that the system is properly equipped and maintained. Texans pay on average some of the lowest rates per kw/h, just over 60% of what Californians shell out. I'm sure most people wouldn't mind paying a little more if it meant the system was reliable during severe conditions. But it's up to the regulators to make sure we're getting what we're paying for.

If everything in the protection scheme works, then the circuit breakers will open on low voltage/high amperage. If the protection scheme doesn’t work exactly as designed, you overheat conductors, which melts insulation, leading to arcing, fires and possibly explosions in transformers. Even if the protection scheme works as designed, you can get into a cascading situation, until you either dump enough load, or all the generators go offline and you have to do a “black start” on the whole grid, which no one has ever done.

The Texas grid isn’t completely isolated from the rest of the US grid, as I recall, but it only has two interconnections and they are (were) normally open.

Welcome to what will be a daily occurance once all cars are electric.

quote:

Originally posted by Scooter123:
Welcome to what will be a daily occurance once all cars are electric.

Or the fact that you now have no way to charge your electric car to get somewhere else!!!

Here in Florida, it's a fairly common occurence to lose electricity for 14-21 days straight due to a Hurricane or tropical storm passing through, happens every 5-10 years. Now you have no electricity, and no car after a few days of it.

This WSJ article explains how we got here in Texas with he power issues:

WSJ Article

quote:

Originally posted by Nuclear:
If everything in the protection scheme works, then the circuit breakers will open on low voltage/high amperage. If the protection scheme doesn’t work exactly as designed, you overheat conductors, which melts insulation, leading to arcing, fires and possibly explosions in transformers. Even if the protection scheme works as designed, you can get into a cascading situation, until you either dump enough load, or all the generators go offline and you have to do a “black start” on the whole grid, which no one has ever done.

The Texas grid isn’t completely isolated from the rest of the US grid, as I recall, but it only has two interconnections and they are (were) normally open.

Underfrequency situations can occur on the grid which brings about that cascading thing . The system runs on 60 Hz . It does not do well at 59 .

quote:

Originally posted by Puckpilot78:
Texans pay on average some of the lowest rates per kw/h, just over 60% of what Californians shell out. I'm sure most people wouldn't mind paying a little more if it meant the system was reliable during severe conditions. But it's up to the regulators to make sure we're getting what we're paying for.

And that's how California logic takes over in Texas. I'm sure everyone would agree if we spent just a little bit more, the world would be a better place. What is being completely missed is that Californians pay more than Texans and have a less reliable system. There's no gaurantee that spending more, regulating more, more government, etc. will solve the problem. California seems to prove that every day.

I get that people are pissed in Texas, but take a step back and ask yourself how bad is not having electricity for 5 days out of the last 36,500 days or so? How much do you want to spend to take a system that is 99.99% reliable to make it 99.999% reliable?

It's interesting to me to see the confirmation bias present across the aisles on this. Conservative talking heads saying the wind turbines are to blame. Liberal talking heads saying the fossil and nuclear fuels are to blame. The real answer is that Texas as a generic term did not plan for this weather by updating critical infrastructure. The causes of that poor planning are debatable, but the truth is that gas lines froze, plants went off line, and the populace got fucked. Wind turbines don't provide nearly enough power in Texas to be a major contributing factor in this debacle.

Texas legislators hide behind the “regulation of private industry is bad” slogan to hide their failures to exercise responsibility. While I generally agree with limiting regulation, it can go way too far.


Here in Texas business lobbyists and campaign contributions run the show, The interests of the citizen always take 2nd place to business lobbyist power.


A couple a days ago I wondered who our state pols would sacrifice to cover their asses. ERCOT employees no doubt.

It is the legislators fault. Pure and simple. Once energy production was handed over to private corporations, their were few incentives or rules requiring weatherizing equipment, reserve availability and back up plans. Why? They cost money! Private industry, which owns the ledge, simply wouldn’t let that happen. The ledge salutes and says “Yes Sir!”