wHAT iS ThiS pLaCE?? 3

[itsmoked]

A friend just back from Kauai was puzzled by this building he passed. Seems like a lot of power to a pretty innocuous building with no visible exhaust stacks. Zoom in behind the transformer line-up and you can see large insulators sticking out of the wall.

What do you folks think it is?

Google link to street view of it

Funny as you move one foot to the right a bunch of trucks appear. LOL. Maybe it's a teleportation node?

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[jraef]

I agree on it being an automated blur. Here's a picture of my house, there is a blur right under the pink flowering tree. Google blurred out a sign my wife puts up that says something about whatever season it is, i.e. "Summer Fun" I think when this shot was taken. No real reason to do that, but the machine doesn't discriminate. I think it helps avoid getting political or offensive signs into the Street View images.

" We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know." -- W. H. Auden

 

[itsmoked]

Ahhh that explains it. Last time I really saw those substations was probably about 35 years ago, there after just assuming they remained. About 30 years ago the city mostly changed from 4kV to 21kV distribution. I remember that every pole with a transformer sprouted another one temporarily hung about 5 feet down from all the existing equipment.

I never realized raising the distribution voltage would allow erasure of entire substations. I would expect the network load to slowly continue rising negating any 'fade-back'. Actually this town is pretty old and not much new has been added in those 30 years. Pretty cool that worked out.

Hey, how'd you see 'way back'?

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[itsmoked]

LOL Cross posted Jeff!

I'd gone to all those substations to see if substation signs were all blurred or if my robot theory was more likely. That's when I was shocked to see the missing substations. Subsequently I found the substation names on two substations though one was painted in huge hand printed letters across the large wood gate and the other was blurry, but knowing what it likely said I was able to read it - not like obliterated as Google would do. Neither was a solid rebuttal to "erasing substation names". Actually your example is a better argument to "stupid robot" erasure. Thanks.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[davidbeach]

Google earth, not Google maps. There's a slider to pick images along a time line from the earliest to most recent. Image quality generally improves with time.

 

[itsmoked]

Thanks that!

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[bacon4life]

Google & Microsoft have had to put in lots of privacy protection algorithms based on the recent German/EU court cases requiring that customers have privacy by default instead of having to actively opt out of every single company collecting data on them. I am kind of glad Google is applying at least some sort of privacy protection outside of Germany as well.

In Google Street View you can click on the date of the photo to go back to other historical images. Kind of weird Google maps doesn't seem to offer this with the aerial view. When we switched from 4 kV to 12 kV, a whole lot of substations were eliminated.

 

[cranky108]

Maybe the critical nature of the customer would qualify to have a substation blurred out. Would you expect the find the substation feeding area 51? Maybe look at other military bases.

And may be you should not look at those, as the gentlemen that are now knocking at my door will attest to.

 

[JG2828]

Interesting wroggent. I have never seen an entire house blurred on streetview. It looks like they forgot to ask Bing to do the same thing. It is nice and clear there.

https://www.bing.com/maps?osid=ea61....08398528&style=x&mo=z.0&v=2&sV=2&form=S00027

 

[JG2828]

Davidbeach,
Good point about the slider on Google Earth. I wish they would port that feature over to google maps. For a long distance perspective they have something called Google Earth Time Lapse

https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse/

Which is pretty cool. You can see how entire cities change over the years.
I also hate that Google maps doesn't clearly tell you when the photo was captured. It makes it very difficult sometimes. If I can't find what I'm looking for with Google maps, I try Bing maps. Their Aerial View feature, when it is clear, comes in handy.
Here is that same missing substation. In Bing maps it is still there.

https://www.bing.com/maps?osid=d0b7...qc&lvl=19&dir=90&style=b&v=2&sV=2&form=S00027

 

[itsmoked]

!! There it is! I wasn't hallucinating. Funny that while I remembered the transformers and switch gear I didn't remember that building.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[itsmoked]

BTW it sort of looks like two pad mounted xfrmrs are in place in that one missing substation. microsub?

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[LionelHutz]

Looking at the poles on the highway near that station, I see 4 underground feeds going up the poles to the distribution lines. Appears to be one distribution line straight through with an isolation switch adjacent to the station and 3 feeds total plus another distribution line going north only with 1 feed.

The Santa Cruz location appears to be a messed up image in Google, even if it was being decommissioned or rebuilt. It does show what appears to be 2 newer pad mounts and some kind of digging being done for either new construction or to remove existing undergrounds and/or footings. The Bing birds eye view is definitely an older picture since the adjacent parking lots are not there, and the Bing aerial view is likely older too since those padmounts are not in it. Maybe it's being re-built, re-purposed or upgraded?

 

[Mbrooke]

4kv can't travel very far unlike say 23kv. In fact for many POCOs their modern distribution voltage is their old sub-tranmission voltage. Its not uncommon to re-use the old sub-transmission system completely bypassing the old "intermediates". This is the cheapest and easiest way to do it. Extra circuits at that voltage are drawn out of the transmission substation to compensate for the increasing load. New subs are added (115kv-23kv) and extra transformers are added to the existing 23kv supply substations. Like this you have a "seamless" upgrade maximizing assets. No need to start from scratch.


Also keep in mind most existing 4kv substations are at least 40 years old. Many are well over 60. New 4kv construction ended in the 70s, and for a lot of POCOs before that time period. Getting rid of these stations is the best solution.

 

[Skogsgurra]

Two flat-bed cars and a van with ladders on top. That is what you expect at a substation.
Not so often seen near pump stations. The large tubes or the surge tower are a giveaway in such cases (pumping stations).

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

--------------------------------------
Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[stevenal]

Or any place with air conditioning.
[URL unfurl="true"]http://www.rutanrefrigeration.com/[/url]
Link