I sort of want to go jet boating.....
General North Texas is getting lake effect snow.
- Thread starter ThatOneDude
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What are those pants ? Lol
Hunting coveralls. Waterproof, windproof, smell proof, sound proof, snowproof. Very warm.
Ahhhh. Makes sense. From that angle, they look like floral gaucho pants.
The blizzard is heading in from the west....
Cold and humid.
Ice on power lines is what I'd be worried about ..hope they don't start snapping.
It was like 8 years ago, but there was a cold snap like this and Austin had to do rolling blackouts across the city. Businesses had to close, and neighborhoods would cycle in and out of having power the whole day. The power grid couldn’t handle every home and business running their heat. They had a loose schedule that they blasted on the news so you could sort of plan for it. But that day we didn’t have power at our hose twice, about an hour each time. And then they’d kick it in and move on to the next.
I had never seen anything like that, disappointed that’s our infrastructure capability. I know a bunch of work has been done like bigger lines and more substations, but I’m not sure how much of that they remedied.
Just got a text from the power company concerning that. Yayyyy.
Most of the lines in neighborhoods around here are in ground, the lines coming into the neighborhoods are not
What does that have to do with conserving power. You either have it or you don't, right?
Or is Texas like California now and they have to do rolling blackouts because they fucked up their energy grid so bad?
Thankfully our heat and hot water runs off gas.
They don't do this in the summer so I am guessing they are expecting a ridiculous demand.
Ya it's too late
Looks like we have some crafts to work on this afternoon after I go pick these up.
#craftlife
#crafting
#scrapbooking
#craftlife
#crafting
#scrapbooking
We just got a text from the power company about conserving energy on Tuesday. I guess businesses and buildings will be open on Tuesday, using power, so there will be a bigger demand then.
Aren't businesses open every Tuesday?
I'm not seeing the demand difference between this and 110 degree summer days. I assume every house in Texas runs their AC through most of the summer.
I get that downed lines will be an issue from ice, but the conserving energy thing puzzles me. Especially when you consider most heat is likely gas.
Not saying it isn't necessary - I just don't understand why.
Remember our houses aren't as insulated as yours are either.
My heat is set to 70 and I'm only seeing an average temp of 69, this is horse shit.
Why Winter Freeze Is Affecting Our Power Grids
During the harshest cold weather this winter, some Midwestern utility companies asked residents to turn down their thermostats. But why?
February 6, 2019
Utility companies asking for lowered thermostats
By Jonny Lupsha, News Writer
The 2018-2019 winter season, so far, has provided record-breaking cold temperatures in the upper part of the country. During January’s polar vortex event, residents of the Midwest reported wind chills as low as -55 degrees Fahrenheit (-48 Celsius). This unprecedented cold took 21 lives before temperatures reascended to regular levels. Additionally, it forced the city of Chicago to set its train tracks on fire for railroad cars to pass along them without derailing.
However, during this time, some utility companies advised their customers to lower their thermostats and endure colder temperatures. The reason for this is actually quite simple: to avoid overtaxing the electrical grid that nearly every home in America uses every day. It may seem difficult to believe that the difference of a couple degrees per home could disrupt an entire regional power grid, since just five grids provide enough electricity to power the entirety of North America.
Many of us take the grid for granted. When we get a cold beverage from the refrigerator, we likely don’t consider the generating plant hundreds of miles away that helps keep the fridge cold. When we turn on a light switch, we don’t think about the conductors sending up to 765,000 volts to every area in their network. So what is “the grid” and how does it get overworked?
Understanding the Grid
When a generating plant produces power, the power gets sent to a nearby “switchyard” that houses transformers. Transformers are devices that can raise or lower electric voltage. At the switchyards, the transformers raise the voltage up to several hundred thousand watts of electricity. To prevent overheating, the coils are immersed in mineral oil, which in turn is cooled by fans or cooling fins.
Next, the energy travels along electrically conductive cabling called transmission feeders. These feeders are the main power supply lines leading from the generating plant on the way to our homes. Bare aluminum cable comprises transmission feeders and their counterparts, distribution feeders.
The next step involves the energy passing through a regional substation, which is a facility that manages electrical energy. At each substation, transformers do the opposite of the job they did at plant switchyards. They “step the voltage down to an intermediate level–typically between 35,000 and 138,000 volts–for sub-transmission to a series of smaller substations located closer to consumers,” said Dr. Stephen Ressler, Professor Emeritus from the United States Military Academy at West Point.
At the end of electricity’s journey, the smaller, local substations lower the voltage again to as little as 2,400 volts to prepare the energy for individual users. “Finally, just outside your home, the power is stepped down once more to 120 volts,” Dr. Ressler said.
Dealing with High Demand
When record-breaking winter weather approaches, keeping your house a cooler temperature isn’t a popular idea. Unfortunately, a surge in electricity use recently caused a fire at a natural gas compressor station in Michigan. This incident left many Midwesterners with a smaller supply of energy to heat their homes. In turn, the state’s government partnered with several utility companies and made such a request. They asked residents to lower their in-home temperatures to 65 degrees to help ease the burden on the remaining plants.
How does this happen? “The total electrical power generated within a regional grid must exactly meet the total demand for power at any given time,” Dr. Ressler said. He explains that when you use electricity, the increased demand for power slows down a generator miles away. The slowdown is minimal, but as Dr. Ressler said, “an automatic control system increases the flow of steam into the adjoining turbine.” This change adds torque to compensate for the slowdown and to keep the generator shaft turning at the necessary speed.
Sudden spikes in energy use lead to major problems. Generators overheat and cause fires like the one in Michigan. The regional grid reroutes power from most failing equipment, but the total output of energy is lessened. To prevent further incidents, residents must lower their energy consumption.
Electricians and engineers implement fail safes and backups to keep our world running, but no system is perfect. Lowering thermostats in the winter and raising them in the summer by just a few degrees can drastically impact your electricity bill and protect your community’s power supply.
Dr. Stephen Ressler contributed to this article.
Dr. Ressler is Professor Emeritus from the United States Military Academy at West Point and a Distinguished Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).
During the harshest cold weather this winter, some Midwestern utility companies asked residents to turn down their thermostats. But why?
February 6, 2019
Utility companies asking for lowered thermostats
By Jonny Lupsha, News Writer
The 2018-2019 winter season, so far, has provided record-breaking cold temperatures in the upper part of the country. During January’s polar vortex event, residents of the Midwest reported wind chills as low as -55 degrees Fahrenheit (-48 Celsius). This unprecedented cold took 21 lives before temperatures reascended to regular levels. Additionally, it forced the city of Chicago to set its train tracks on fire for railroad cars to pass along them without derailing.
However, during this time, some utility companies advised their customers to lower their thermostats and endure colder temperatures. The reason for this is actually quite simple: to avoid overtaxing the electrical grid that nearly every home in America uses every day. It may seem difficult to believe that the difference of a couple degrees per home could disrupt an entire regional power grid, since just five grids provide enough electricity to power the entirety of North America.
Many of us take the grid for granted. When we get a cold beverage from the refrigerator, we likely don’t consider the generating plant hundreds of miles away that helps keep the fridge cold. When we turn on a light switch, we don’t think about the conductors sending up to 765,000 volts to every area in their network. So what is “the grid” and how does it get overworked?
Understanding the Grid
When a generating plant produces power, the power gets sent to a nearby “switchyard” that houses transformers. Transformers are devices that can raise or lower electric voltage. At the switchyards, the transformers raise the voltage up to several hundred thousand watts of electricity. To prevent overheating, the coils are immersed in mineral oil, which in turn is cooled by fans or cooling fins.
Next, the energy travels along electrically conductive cabling called transmission feeders. These feeders are the main power supply lines leading from the generating plant on the way to our homes. Bare aluminum cable comprises transmission feeders and their counterparts, distribution feeders.
The next step involves the energy passing through a regional substation, which is a facility that manages electrical energy. At each substation, transformers do the opposite of the job they did at plant switchyards. They “step the voltage down to an intermediate level–typically between 35,000 and 138,000 volts–for sub-transmission to a series of smaller substations located closer to consumers,” said Dr. Stephen Ressler, Professor Emeritus from the United States Military Academy at West Point.
At the end of electricity’s journey, the smaller, local substations lower the voltage again to as little as 2,400 volts to prepare the energy for individual users. “Finally, just outside your home, the power is stepped down once more to 120 volts,” Dr. Ressler said.
Dealing with High Demand
When record-breaking winter weather approaches, keeping your house a cooler temperature isn’t a popular idea. Unfortunately, a surge in electricity use recently caused a fire at a natural gas compressor station in Michigan. This incident left many Midwesterners with a smaller supply of energy to heat their homes. In turn, the state’s government partnered with several utility companies and made such a request. They asked residents to lower their in-home temperatures to 65 degrees to help ease the burden on the remaining plants.
How does this happen? “The total electrical power generated within a regional grid must exactly meet the total demand for power at any given time,” Dr. Ressler said. He explains that when you use electricity, the increased demand for power slows down a generator miles away. The slowdown is minimal, but as Dr. Ressler said, “an automatic control system increases the flow of steam into the adjoining turbine.” This change adds torque to compensate for the slowdown and to keep the generator shaft turning at the necessary speed.
Sudden spikes in energy use lead to major problems. Generators overheat and cause fires like the one in Michigan. The regional grid reroutes power from most failing equipment, but the total output of energy is lessened. To prevent further incidents, residents must lower their energy consumption.
Electricians and engineers implement fail safes and backups to keep our world running, but no system is perfect. Lowering thermostats in the winter and raising them in the summer by just a few degrees can drastically impact your electricity bill and protect your community’s power supply.
Dr. Stephen Ressler contributed to this article.
Dr. Ressler is Professor Emeritus from the United States Military Academy at West Point and a Distinguished Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).
Found this. Not sure how helpful....
Another issue with extreme temperatures is that consumer demand for energy is usually higher. Heat pumps are operating almost continuously, emergency heat systems and electric space heaters may be running concurrently, and other behaviors occur that cause the energy demand to increase substantially. If temperature extremes are worse than forecast and/or happen faster than forecast, the utilities may not have planned for or had enough time to bring sufficient generation online to support the demand. This can result in local or widespread overloads that may cause service to some neighborhoods to go offline automatically or switch to rotating blackouts.
In an age when more homeowners are using solar panels to generate their own electricity, bad weather usually limits the output of these devices and increases the amount of energy the utility must supply, making the problem even worse. Self-generation of electricity by customers essentially hides the true energy demand of a residence or building from the utility, making it difficult for them to know how much energy they must be able to supply instantaneously when those self-generation sources go offline or are substantially reduced.
The power system in Texas experienced all of these problems during the extreme cold weather earlier in January. The severe cold at some power plants interfered with the proper operation of sensors, hydraulic lines, and other electromechanical support equipment, resulting in some plants shutting themselves down. This lack of generation, coupled with an extremely high energy demand, caused ERCOT, the Texas system operator, to issue an energy alert the morning of January 6 asking customers to conserve energy—they were on the verge of rotating blackouts. Thankfully, the careful planning and conservative operating practices of the system operator allowed it to ride through these challenges.
Another issue with extreme temperatures is that consumer demand for energy is usually higher. Heat pumps are operating almost continuously, emergency heat systems and electric space heaters may be running concurrently, and other behaviors occur that cause the energy demand to increase substantially. If temperature extremes are worse than forecast and/or happen faster than forecast, the utilities may not have planned for or had enough time to bring sufficient generation online to support the demand. This can result in local or widespread overloads that may cause service to some neighborhoods to go offline automatically or switch to rotating blackouts.
In an age when more homeowners are using solar panels to generate their own electricity, bad weather usually limits the output of these devices and increases the amount of energy the utility must supply, making the problem even worse. Self-generation of electricity by customers essentially hides the true energy demand of a residence or building from the utility, making it difficult for them to know how much energy they must be able to supply instantaneously when those self-generation sources go offline or are substantially reduced.
The power system in Texas experienced all of these problems during the extreme cold weather earlier in January. The severe cold at some power plants interfered with the proper operation of sensors, hydraulic lines, and other electromechanical support equipment, resulting in some plants shutting themselves down. This lack of generation, coupled with an extremely high energy demand, caused ERCOT, the Texas system operator, to issue an energy alert the morning of January 6 asking customers to conserve energy—they were on the verge of rotating blackouts. Thankfully, the careful planning and conservative operating practices of the system operator allowed it to ride through these challenges.
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