Texas power issues. Wind farms getting iced up (Part II)... 38

[JohnRBaker]

It appears that ERCOT is still skating on thin ice:

Texas Nearly Went Dark Because Officials Misjudged Weather

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/texas-nearly-went-dark-again-153640257.html

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-'Product Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without

 

[davefitz]

spring is the best time for outages, due to low air conditioning loads and expected low heating demand. It looks like they got surprised by another cold spell. More late cold spells may be in the future due to the grand solar minimum; if the Thames freezes over, maybe Algor will have a stroke.

"...when logic, and proportion, have fallen, sloppy dead..." Grace Slick

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

In case anyone is wondering what a ex Soviet transformer setup looks like.

Here is the one that blew up that I was talking about.

 

[RedSnake]

Don't know where to start, so I will just leave it at that.

Best Regards A

“Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere.“
Albert Einstein

 

[CWB1]

I am one of those fools that had "way too much pep"...After a few months, I just started ordering everything online instead. I haven't nor has my family gotten the virus. The average bill I saw for someone needing medical care was $40,000 and that is not counting longterm issues.

My prior post wasn't criticizing anyone for having a stash of PPE. I actually keep a half dozen N95s in my garage next to the nitrile gloves, respirator, and other safety gear for household and automotive projects bc its better safe than sorry on your health. I was simply commenting on the absurdity of walking into a doctor's office or hospital in a spacesuit after a year+ of normalcy and criticizing staff who treated COVID at its worst for not wearing much/any PPE.

As to the rest, I would recommend turning off or finding better media bc most of what you posted is nonsense. Stateside, in a few areas non-COVID patients were evacuated out of facilities that were expected to be hit hard but there was never actually lack of space for COVID patients, lack of PPE or ventilators, risk of side-effects, nor cost to patients for treatment or vaccines. We wasted trillions building medical and PPE/vent manufacturing that was never needed or used, and offsetting an economy needlessly shut down. There's also the potential future impact of the US govt having cried wolf last spring. If we have a legitimate epidemic in the near future then we're screwed as this winter's "second wave" proved that the public doesn't take shutdown orders seriously anymore nor can the govt enforce them.

If we'd like to discuss handling the concern badly, we could discuss the fact that much of Canada, Europe, and otherwise are still under govt restrictions of their basic human rights a year+ later. As an American, visiting is reminiscent of third-world dictatorships that I saw in the military.

 

[1503-44]

Why are you talking about that here?

But, yes, the previous administration made a grand FU of all of it. You must have seen the Senator Jordan mouth on 100 round automatic fire fiasco. If restricting basic rights keeps the death tool below 600,000, then I'm OK with that. My rights finish when my actions affect my neighbors. The US is full of stories about restricting rights. The only real violation of my basic rights I ever experienced occured with the US Army draft system, but ask the Americans of Japanese descent about WWII. Need I say more. Furthermore I can grasp the concept that basic rights can be a dynamic situation that a bill of rights attached to a rather static constitutional document will never properly address all the time. Special times require special measures. You did not see anything at all about dictators restricting human rights. What you saw are people respecting the rights of other's just as much as they expect thier own rights to be respected by others. Don't confuse that with restriction of liberties and freedom. And don't go too far off the rails praising USA human rights. The USA is only the 25th most democratic country in the world and the USA still has much to learn about that. Look, the USA is all about respecting "MY, MY, MY", rights, nobody elses. Today the USA ranking is IMO almost unmeasureable when it comes to respecting the rights and liberties of others. Its a ME ME ME thing only.

Give it a rest.

 

[Overvoltage]

Alistair_Heaton: Would love to see a schematic for that. Some of it makes perfect sense, and some of it is...different. But hey, as long as it works and it doesn't shock the livestock or people.

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

its apparently a spur off a HV delta supply.

Which is then radial off as star 400V.

There is a manual disconnect from the HV which I used with the help of a Makita 18V grinder to take the padlock off when it went on fire.

The consumer lines are a mixture of bare wire and 4 core insulated. The bare are scheduled to be replaced inside 2 years unless they fail before that.

And its scheduled to get a fence put round it. Although nobody or animals has died off setups like this in years in country.

I am a mechie and the guy that I asked is a very senior grid bloke and as such is way way below his pay grade.

Its due to be smart grid switched what ever that means but that will happen when they up grade the rest of the bare wire.

 

[Overvoltage]

Alistair_Heaton: Thanks!

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

No problem. I am interested now in what smart grid switched means and allows them to do.

 

[waross]

Mostly marketing to make it easier to pass the cost of needed upgrades on to the customer.
The new equipment installed may fall short of the customer's imagination of what is a "Smart Grid".
In many situations, using someone else's imagination against themselves is very effective.

Bill
--------------------
Ohm's law
Not just a good idea;
It's the LAW!

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

Nah the whole of the EU grid is going smart with power factor and load reduction and increase.

He is finding out if it's going to have IP over powerline for ripple receivers.

Plus you won't need a grinder to kill the HV line

 

[RedSnake]

Everything will be considered "smart" compared to that. ;-)
Do not mean that it is unfunctional, only that it is "keep it simple". ;-)
I usually like keep it simple, but that has to many hazards. :-(

BR A


“Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere.“
Albert Einstein

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

Well through the solar stuff I seem to have more knowledge than the grid bloke. He didn't have a clue that the grid could change the load factor output of the solar inverter or require it to decrease injection.

He is extremely interested. He is mid project for three condensers for the grid which are DC motors to produce reactive power. If he could get rid of one of them it would pay for a complete ripple system if he could get all the solar inverters to go to 0.8 PF injection inside 30 seconds.

 

[RedSnake]

You know more about that stuff then me too. ;-)
At work we are obliged to keep the reactive load at a certain level.
So we use capacitor batteries on the large motor drives.

BR A

“Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere.“
Albert Einstein

 

[FacEngrPE]

Power factor correction on the grid used to be by Synchronous condenser - actually a free spinning synchronous motor. It will make + or - vars depending on the excitation.

There now is whole range of devices used for var compensation under the general heading of "Flexible AC Transmission Systems" which is being marketed as a component of smart grid.
The reliable synchronous condenser is still in the mix, and is the only one that inherently supports system inertia. There are a few locations where generators in retired fossil power plants have been repurposed as synchronous condenser.

https://www.power-eng.com/coal/conv...onous-generators-into-synchronous-condensers/

Here is a listing of devices that all are used for VAR control.

https://www.siemens-energy.com/glob...rtfolio/flexible-ac-transmission-systems.html

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

I find all quiet interesting.

Here they were 95% oil shale in 2010 and they have now got to 20% renewables. Most of which is inverters. Which can be centrally controlled if you have the infrastructure to do it.

They also have historical issues with the grid from Soviet times as you can see from the photo. For years the people running things were ex soviet trained power engineers with resultant issues with resisting change. A lot of them were involved with Chernobyl They are all retiring now and they are bring in younger western trained engineers who are looking to future proof the system instead of just applying a Band-Aid which was the old mindset.

 

[1503-44]

Since we talked about the Nordstream II Pipeline somewhere up there, there is this update,

US call for sanctions against 20 EU companies starting to get hot. Merkel says Nordstream II is no worse than Nordstream I or the gas that comes from Russia across Ukraine or Turkey. IMO these sanctions have a real potential to severely piss off the EU. It might even force them to go their own way and develop an international Euro transaction system.

https://www.mail.com/int/business/m...s-bidens-europe-outre.html#.1258-stage-set8-3

 

[dik]

That could have some real interesting consequences for the US. The US ability to 'print money' is predicated on their being the de facto #1. If this were to change, to reiterate, this could have some real interesting consequences. One of the reasons Hussein was 'taken out' was the he wanted to change to the Euro... another one was that he wasn't nuclear...

Rather than think climate change and the corona virus as science, think of it as the wrath of God. Feel any better?

-Dik

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

I have been watching the Fortuna and the Akademik Cherskiy Both seem to have loads of supply vessels coming out of St Petersburg and Kaliningrad and they have been getting nearer each other over the past few wees since we talked about them.

Its reckon to have cost 11 billion. And its a bit unrealistic to think that they will write that off because the US doesn't like it.

I have seen estimates that gas will start flowing through it by end of August early September.