Texas power issues. Windfarms getting iced up. 67

[Alistair_Heaton]

That's a lot of capacity that's been lost. Must admit being Aberdonian we always associate Texas with hot and humid... Not snow storms.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...nd-turbines-texas-power-outages-b1802596.html

 

[1503-44]

They will fill a bath, if you purchase one with adequate flow capacity. They come in various sizes.

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

I am sure they will, also suspect the gas American versions are significantly more hot rod than a EU electric ones on the end of a 16 amp 230V radial which gives you max 3.5kW.

I think you can get 45 kW gas ones which can do 20 litres a min to fill a 150 ltr bath.. Which is more than 22mm copper pipe can handle anyway.

The single phase tankless electric heaters I have seen. I have a higher flow rate with my first of the day pee in the morning.

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

And coming back to miningman's comment about even places that normally have -20 to -30 temps every year we screw up.

My excuse is I am Scottish and used to dealing with -5 min.

I did all the right stuff when I built my house. Water pipes away from external walls. Put them in between floors put them on supports put 15mm of insulation round them lagging.

One pair of pipes needed to go down the external wall to the shower room sink. Ok wood wall 50mm supports with 50mm rockwool. Pipe lagging..... After 3 weeks of -20 it froze when it went to -35 one night.

There was a metal screw through the wall about 1 cm away from the metal pipe support and even copper pipe couldn't keep up with the heat transfer. Brother in law is just laughing saying see if you had gone for the cheap plastic pipe supports like the rest of us it wouldn't have frozen...

 

[1503-44]

I changed the previous owner's installation from a 6 to a 15 L/m and added a half-bath with another 12 L/m unit there. I also removed some flow restrictors in the pipes. I think he didn't want his wife to take baths. They use butane/propane. With the climate here, I spend more on mobile/internet/Netflix than on total energy consumed, including electricity for the house and petrol for the car.

After the week long freeze in Houston '83, I electric heat traced a couple of pipes I had running across the attic that froze. Never froze again.

 

[itsmoked]

Redsnake; Tankless water-heaters are the devil's own.

I have never seen one that runs on batteries as BigInch describes. All the ones I see run on the mains power supply with gas as the heating source. So there you lose yet another staple on a power outage.

When there is a water crisis and some fool who installed a tankless water heater and by definition water-storageless-system comes calling with a cup for water I'll run them off as too short sighted to continue propagating in the human gene pool.

I wouldn't dream of losing 60 gallons of instantly available potable water just to save a few dollars a year on gas.

I've also had to fight tankless water heaters which can waste a bunch of energy because you have to flow more hot water than you need simply to keep the dumb things lit. I have customers that wrestle with this constantly. One poor lady has to run her bathroom sink while showering as the flow restricted shower heads can't pass enough water to keep the on-demand on. Can you imagine!! Turn the bathroom sink on then get in the shower!?

During a moment of stupidity I bought one, brought it home and discovered I'd have to tear out my house gas lines and change them up to 1" from 3/4" or when the tankless water heater and the furnace came on at the same time they'd both crap-out on low gas pressure. On top of that I'd have to tear out the 3" flue and replace it with a 6" flue. I boxed it all up and took it back.

Instead I put in a 60 gallon tanked heater with a 65kBTU burner instead of the typical 30kBTU. It gets with the program at about 1/3 of what an on-deamd would require. If I catch the heater at a low temp point when starting a shower and it lights off I have to adjust the shower temp down a couple of times as it heats faster than a shower uses it. It's great.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[1503-44]

My graph posting isn't updating either. Link shows two rather big expected cutbacks will happen in Houston today.

Tankless heaters.
You have to get the proper capacity!!!
My bottled gas supply is 2m away through a 1/2" rubber hose.
Work like a charm.

In many regions in Spain, you can get into remote locations off grid rather quickly. There are lots of small solar cell installations and bottled gas water heaters, not to save the planet, but simply because of lack of grid access.

 

[RedSnake]

I'll run them off as too short sighted to continue propagating in the human gene pool.

Sorry could not resist, I am a bit of a darwinist myself. ;-)

The only thing a knew about those electric shower heaters was that they is common in Asia.
There was a case when a Swedish guy was electrocuted on holiday and died when taking a shower due to bad electricals.

If you are connected to the official water grid here its always self flowing, there has to be a long power cut out if you are going to became out of water.
Can't remember that ever happening here.
If you have your own well it's different.
I could always boil water on my grill if a was out of electricity, but it almost never happens in town, max up to an hour maybe 3 or 4 times a year, the most annoying is having to set the time on clocks without battery backup.

Well here is an off the grid option.
Cheap to buy.
Cheap to install.
Saves on electricity bills and gym card fees.
Works in all weathers.
More fun then other bathtubs.
Only down side you have to cut down one tree and replant two, preferably pine or spruce (binds more CO₂). ;-)

Best Regards A




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

 

[FacEngrPE]

FERC is at least going to investigate "FERC, NERC to Open Joint Inquiry into 2021 Cold Weather Grid Operations February 16, 2021"

https://www.ferc.gov/news-events/news/ferc-nerc-open-joint-inquiry-2021-cold-weather-grid-operations

The FERC report John R Baler cites from the event cites "Outages and curtailments During the Southwest Cold Weather Event Feb 1-5 2011

https://www.ferc.gov/legal/staff-reports/08-16-11-report.pdf

An event on January 17, 2018 created similar trouble in the Midwest (but Texas dodged this one).

https://files.engineering.com/getfi...e05e7f8aa5&file=07-18-19-ferc-nerc-report.pdf

I wounder how much of the Natural Gas supply was put off line by the rolling blackouts? That was one of the findings in the 2011 report. That might be important here as some of the generating limitations are from natural gas supply limitations.

Fred

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

Any news on the nuke with water feed issues?

I know its second Gen and should have a torus and emergency cooling etc and it will still be fully powered so shouldn't have any issues.

Bottled gas is useless here for 3 months of the year unless you store it internally inside the heating area. I could have had it in the cellar with a burner linking into the heatpump system but it was to much of a pain in the bum.

 

[FacEngrPE]

Nothing on NRC's website yet.

FERC, NERC to Open Joint Inquiry into 2021 Cold Weather Grid Operations

https://www.nerc.com/news/Pages/FER...y-into-2021-Cold-Weather-Grid-Operations.aspx

Redsnake
I would love to be supplied from a self flowing water supply system. Here on the coastal plane of Virginia, just like in Texas it is too flat to do that. The supply consists of wells, and surface water collection, all of it needs to be pumped.

Sewage has the same problem, to get it to treatment it needs to be pumped and sent by pipe line to treatment.

Here water and sewage have generator backup to keep the systems functioning. Backup power became a necessity here in 2003 following Hurricane Isabel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_Hurricane_Isabel_in_Virginia

It took the utility 3 days to get the bulk power system here on line (trees blown into the 115kv lines) and more than 10 days to get all of the customers on line.

In the current storm since icing has been widespread, not just Texas, there likely will be some lines pulled down by ice buildup. Hopefully not including parts of the bulk power system.

Fred

 

[thebard3]

I'm getting a little weary from reading this thread.

This isn't the first time there has been a major power disruption that affected large areas and millions of people. It's a little bit of a 'perfect storm' because it happened during a particularly bad weather event. Others have occurred during hot weather that is more survivable for most people.

I haven't found any technical detail anywhere that's of value to indicate what really initiated the problem. It's too early to blame things on regulation/deregulation, Rick Perry, reliability of wind turbines, hurricane building codes or the like. It's all speculation at this point. I'm willing to wait on the investigations and findings to see if real germane legislation will emerge to prevent a reoccurrence.

Power grids, like everything else, will always be less than 100% reliable.

Brad Waybright

The more you know, the more you know you don't know.

 

[itsmoked]

I'd take reasonable rolling black-outs over over-priced power every time after living thru the CA debacle back a few years ago.

Not having a day or two of rotating blackouts cost the CA rate payers a fortune. I remember our rates doubled for about 2 years just because someone (ISO?) decided to massively overpay for those 2 days instead of going for rolling black-outs. It sure wasn't worth it.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

The initial blame it on the renewables is pretty much out the window now... Which is where I picked it up....

I am sure they will blame it on IT and a computer bug eventually....

 

[itsmoked]

BI; I visited a remote place in Mexico about 20 years ago. If you wanted a shower you broke-up one of those slatted fruit crates and jammed about a third of it into the bottom of a weird boxy water heater and lit it with some paper and match. About 20 minutes later you had nice hot water. It was pretty impressive though probably environmentally poor.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[RedSnake]

FacEngrPE
The supply consists of wells, and surface water collection, all of it needs to be pumped.

Well it is pumped here to, but to water towers in high locations.
Even though they try to use Newton as much as possible.
All sewage is done by Newton..
So it will stop coming when the tower is empty if the power is not back on.
I would guess most of them have reserv power at least the ones supplying hospitals etc.

Bet Regards A


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

 

[byrdj]

The initial blame it on the renewables is pretty much out the window now... Which is where I picked it up....

Sorry. . .

Old "dinosaurs" can't take a liken to those new fangled stuff.

Steam, rotating inertia and coal still bring back memories of my "glory days"

(besides, I am afraid of heigths so NO WAY would I have worked wind generator)

 

[1503-44]

Gov Abbot of TX blames AOC & renewables. "Methinks the govna' doth protest too much."
Im betting he'll walk home with that rooster and this originated at the gas fields with wells offline due to low price and other operators that didn't light up the well heaters in time to prevent freeze ups. Hydrates can start appearing at low 40s°F

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

Bah you can always spot when a politician is in the deep poo and are trying to lie there way out of it before they drown...

You can see their lips move.

 

[LionelHutz]

I'd rather read a few post with politics somewhat related to the issue then over a dozen posts in a row completely off topic...

 

[FacEngrPE]

Guessing here - FERC and NERC will say this is the 7th (?) time this kind of event has occurred since 1975, for the same reason in Texas. Not sure if the next report will also be a toothless Lion.

Here is where the odd constitutional commerce clause is called.
ERCOT is a Texas entity doing business inside Texas. Do the interconnects (DC Tie) put it into interstate commerce? That might give FERC and NERC some play in texas.

Redsnake
We used to have water towers here (erected ~ 1910). They were mostly demolished due to age related problems. The volume in the water towers with respect to demand now basically just provides some buffering on the pressure control.