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

 

[LittleInch]

Oh yes, I know that, but the reality is that with the auto refrigeration that goes on as the pressure above the Propane goes down the propane pressure falls to levels that the regulator isn't sized for and hence you get low flow or low pressure and the burners just don't work or only have a very small flame. If it's minus 20 odd with wind chill, there just isn't enough heat available in the air to heat the propane enough and the liquid temperature just continues to fall.

I had a little propane burner with a can about the size of an aerosol and one cold night out camping noticed it was a weedy flame. Took the can off which nearly froze to my hand, stuck it under my coat for about 10 minutes to warm up and hey presto - big flames again.

-20C for propane only gets you about 2 bar pressure. Normal operating is about 6-7 bar. Lots of "LPG" contains Butane as well which has a higher boiling point.

And you need a lot of hot water (from where?) as you need to heat up the steel cylinder as well as all the liquid propane.



Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

 

[1503-44]

LI is correct. Butane & propane are funny like that.

Water? From the water heater of course. My bottles only contain 17 kg. Not too big to heat.

 

[LittleInch]

Extreme weather events throw up all sorts of oddball things no one really thought about before.

Some years ago one of the major UK gas import terminals in an area which very rarely got any appreciable snow supplying >30% of the gas supply nearly shut down because the condensate trains taking the condensate away couldn't get through because of snow.

Roads were blocked with snow so you couldn't truck it and they had dismantled the flare system years ago as it wasn't needed / environmentally unacceptable to flare it.

So a little thought about "waste" product nearly shut them down. Only saved by relocating a special snow clearing train from Scotland to clear the lines and get a couple of tanker trains in just before tank top.

Funnily thought the siding was just before the local station. The locals were not amused that the snow plough train stopped at the siding and left them isolated for another week until the snow melted.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

 

[waross]

Ok, say you're a 500MW plant and you've missed 10 hours of a $9000 market because you didn't properly winterize.

I agree that is a valid post, but MBA's are notoriously short sighted.
I'll see your silver haired engineer and raise you a pointy headed MBA. grin

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

 

[miningman]

Little inch, I wont get into technical discussions but I guess we have somewhat different experiences with propane at low temperatures. I dont know the specifics of the regulators we we were using , but I have clear recollections of northern Saskatchewan, where the temperature dropped to minus 42/44 overnite. We knew there was an impending problem so our plumbers ran a couple of extension cords out to our 1000 gallon propane pigs, found a couple of 150 watt heat lamps , installed the lamps under the pigs with a bit of fibreglass insulation and all us office workers remained warm and toasty. Granted a bit different today in Texas if they've got no power but even that wouldnt be insurmountable for Canadian ingenuity.

 

[1503-44]

I like that condensate train example. Good example for "designing for climate change" scenarios and how all of a sudden you realise that you now have a complex system. By my definition, one where all variables sre apparent only in hindsight.

 

[1503-44]

P-T Charts for propane

https://www.pveng.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/DualCert_Low_Image1.png

https://www.researchgate.net/profil...75302183/Saturation-curve-for-100-propane.png

 

[CWB1]

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.

My thoughts throughout this thread have been similar, but I take it a step further and wonder why this is even considered "bad weather" much less newsworthy. Alarmists claiming this to be an emergency were saying that the south doesnt insulate their homes like up north which would cause all manner of tragedy...yet we havent seen tragedy. Having lived many places ranging from Alaska to the middle-east, in TX and now in Detroit where we have many large trailer parks, I call bunk to the hysteria. Many homes and buildings in TX are insulated significantly better than we do up here bc of the (higher) cost of cooling and the much lower humidity allowing better sealing via spray foam and other methods. No doubt there are some poorly built homes/trailers that are cold and without power in TX, so some residents have been inconvenienced by having to stay with a friend or neighbor for a day or two - whoop-dee-doo. The vast majority tho simply put on a sweater like the rest of the country when we experience a winter outage, and there are many places like here in Detroit where a few million people spend several days without power almost every winter. Personally, I believe the heat much more of a risk to life and limb than the cold despite personally having suffered frostbite, but to each their own bc the continental 48 dont see much for extremes in either case.

Interestingly enough tho, there does seem to be a direct correlation between extreme alarmism and political posting, almost as if some folks here are looking for excuses to smear others.

 

[FacEngrPE]

If you need to evaporate any reasonable amount of propane, even in industrial plant quantities you are going to use a fired propane boiler. The tank surface area is too small to keep the pressure up, and it gets worse as the liquid evaporates (less surface area to transfer heat in).

I am only going to stand behind the bulk power system diagram a bit, it is NPR's. The point is that this system upset created an absolutely huge deficit. Transferring in that much bulk power from the eastern and western grids (Mexico does not seem to likely to help much) is a huge task.

 

[Alistair_Heaton]

miningman I think its a volume to surface area thing of the cylinder linked with the surface area that vapour can come off when upright . The pigs are horizontal and quite fat. A single cylinder here and they are the red ones of pure propane won't work either below about -15 C . So the locals either take them inside or have a bank of 4 of them and/or they are set at a 45 deg angle to the ground when they are half full.

 

[1503-44]

Preception is always relative to the norms of the region. Saudis like to BBQ in the rain.

 

[1503-44]

Gas exports to MX have been cut to 40%.

 

[miningman]

And yet less than a month ago , Mr Biden cancelled the proposed Keystone pipeline from Canada towards Texas. I wonder if todays events will cause a rethink ?? Probably not , to much like taking political responsibilty for a self inflicted error

 

[RedSnake]

Well Natural gas also called fossil gas seems to contain a lot of different gases is a naturally occurring hydrocarbon gas mixture consisting primarily of methane, but commonly including varying amounts of other higher alkanes, and sometimes a small percentage of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide, or helium and also water vapor.
So at what temperature it freezes probably depends on the mixture.

Well it is a necessity to have more ingenuity you further north you get, you would not survive otherwise.
So in your Canadian example I would bet on the silver haired Canadian engineer and not the pointy headed MBA. ;-)

But it is also true that it is easier to protect your self from cold weather then from extrem heat.
When the air temperature is higher then your body temp it starts geting critical since the air cooling dose not work anymore especially when the humidity is high, because then there will be no evaporation that can cool down the body either.

Best Regards A




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

 

[1503-44]

Nowhere to put all that Keystone oil. The TX oil price would drop because you'd have to pay somebody to drive it around in 1000 road tankers per day until you get more room in the tanks to unload it. Cushing OK has been topped off pretty much since 2014.

NatGas freeze depends mostly on gas hydrate formation temperature. Can start forming at 40F +/- 5°C.

They are not just picking on Keystone!
EU Texas politicians Perry, Cruz, Cornyn and Abbott are the same guys putting sanctions on Nordstream II pipeline. How do you like them making energy security decisions that affect you!

 

[dik]

The expansion of the gas would make it colder, too...

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

-Dik

 

[cranky108]

I think the Keystone pipeline was for heavy crude, not gas.
Like it or not it was political, and so the oil will travel by other pipelines, or by rail, at a greater cost.
Who really won on that one?

So is the US still exporting LNG?

 

[dik]

In particular if you are modifying a system that had not considered any upgrades... maybe really challenging.

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

-Dik

 

[dik]

Hope not... Keystone was a bad idea...

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

-Dik

 

[1503-44]

Keystone is dead as a doornail. Not political. It is PURE ECONOMICS.
Trump gave it 4yrs of mouth to mouth, but it was just another one of those alternate realities.
Nobody south of the 49th parallel (latitude) wants it. Probably including Canadians.
200 US shale oil producers filed for bankruptcy last year. Too much oil = low prices.
That oil will go to Asia via Transmountain Gateway Whatever, through BC.
Last time Cushing filled up was when US oil price went to $-30/bbl
Brokers and producers had "their fill" of that in a NY second.

US is normally exporting gas to Mexico and the world. Not today though.
There are some 20 LNG export facilities online now, or soon to be.
That is why the US is sanctioning the Russian Nordstream pipeline to EU.
US LNG shipping costs cannot compete in a fair market with cheap Russian gas via pipeline to Germany/EU.