A preview of things to come is unfolding in California right now. A heat wave is causing record energy usage, but the California infrastructure for power transmission is failing under the loads.
Temperatures as high as 108 were expected in the Hollywood Hills, with the mercury likely to pass 110 in the region's desert areas, according to the National Weather Service. At 7 a.m., the weather service said, it was already 77 in downtown Los Angeles, where thermometers peaked at 100 on Sunday.
About 3,500 customers in scattered parts of Los Angeles still had no electricity early Monday, Los Angeles Department of Water and Power spokeswoman MaryAnne Piersen said.
"Probably more than 90 percent of them are due to stress on the system due to the heat," she said. "Different pieces of equipment get fatigued and blow out, so they have to be replaced."
Lightning striking power system equipment during scattered desert thunderstorms added to the strain on the system.
And the ban on coal-fired generation isn't helping matters.
In December, California banned all import of of electricity from coal, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
In September, California are worried about a shortage of electricity in some areas, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
You don’t think the two could be related?
Nyah. Just a coincidence. California, population 36 million, is trying to save the Earth by meeting emissions standards that are tougher than anywhere else in the United States.
Meanwhile, China, population 1,300 million, is not even close to U.S. emissions standards.
A few years back California had massive power problems that were directly related to their artificially low, government-imposed electric rates. Now they are experiencing other problems having to do with overloaded infrastructure, aging equipment and a self-imposed ban on coal-fired electricity. My guess is that if they have a major generating plant trip off line right about now that they will be in real trouble, real fast. Politicians and amateur armchair experts imposing feel-good artificial restrictions do not lead to a good system. Ever.
It may sound calloused, but I have no sympathy whatsoever.
The People’s Republic of California needs a wake-up call.
There’s another aspect to this problem: environmental “activists” and the “not in my back yard” crowd blocking the building of needed new power plants. While the energy deregulation plan was a disaster, it wouldn’t have been nearly half as bad if California had a sensible attitude toward new energy production, nuclear or otherwise. Sadly, we don’t, and there’s little sign our government has learned anything from this, since they’re too busy pandering to the Church of Global Warming.
Having worked with the power industry, what does Gaius’ crystal ball see for California’s power problem? If nothing is done on the supply/transmission side, while demand continues to creep up, what happens? Will it be analogus to a ship springing many leaks? By continually overloading the infrastucture, does it wear out said infrastucture faster? How long can the problem be managed with rolling blackouts? Politics aside, if you are a California power manager, what do you do?
Oh, they’re screwed. The more load on the equipment, the sooner it fails. (Heat is the real enemy.)
I would not want to be one of their load dispatchers. I suspect that is a very high stress job in California. Much worse than elsewhere.
I wondered if that was the case with heat. I used to be in the grain business. Geain Elevators are wired with 3 phase 440 and heat sure seemed to cause breakers and such to fail over time. In fact we had all our electric switch gear and motors checked with infrared cameras once a year to detect problems.
I did breaker panel walkdowns at a nuclear plant using an infrared camera – way back in the day. We found some surprises. (We used the information to load balance the panels.)
IR is also very usefull on transformers and bushings.