.

[turbguy + 1,540]

2 minutes ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Mary Hutzler is arguably the world's expert on variable energy source input.

Then she should have recommended Wartsila's to Georgetown.

[turbguy + 1,540]

You know, the more I think about ERCOT's close call, it just might be that Texans don't own sweaters or long underwear, or if they do, they are not used to using them when that could actually could have done the trick.

Perhaps they need a vacation in January, to Montana, North Dakota, heck, even Edmonton, for instruction.\?

[ronwagn + 6,290]

6 hours ago, NickW said:

Much of that has been replaced by generators contracted in under STOR arrangements although there is still about 1GW of OCGT, often at bigger plants that is available. My company has 2MW of diesel Gensets that partake in this scheme. We also about 700Kw of data centre cooling that can be switched off for a couple of hours if NG need to load shed. 

National Grid Reserve Service - Wikipedia

 

 

We buy insurance for everything we need to protect aynd can afford. I can think of nothing better to buy insurance for than grids that are locally based but on a large grid also. They must be reduntantly powerful, use inexpensive energy and be affordable.

I do not see many Americans, or many other nationalities, willing to give up the power they need once they are used to it. Possibly that is due to the power companies not being willing to reward them adequately for making sacrifices. 

The question is what will a "bullet proof" grid cost. I am talking EMP proof, terrorist proof, weather proof, etc. It is the most important part of our grid, along with our internet, telephone, radio, and other electronic systems. Imagine if our credit cards became useless and our transactions could not be processed. Cash would not be available. One good reason to store some, safely, right now and not in just one place. 

I am considering hardening my own grid with propane for heat and electrical generation. It is probably the cheapest insurance I can buy. Gasoline stations rarely have gernerators to pump with in emergencies. I think that should become a legal requirement for licensure. 

Comments?

Edited February 27, 2021 by ronwagn

[Boat + 1,323]

I am not in favor of wind turbines or any energy being installed on the cheap. I do favor wind and solar but only if they are cost competive. As a state due diligence by doing your research is just smart business. So while one may root for the future of an industry and the demise of another, logically you look for what’s practical. 
Wind would be how much more expensive with weatherization? Would developers have gone with deals or nixed them. This should not be that hard to figure out.
States and the federal government are two different entities. If the feds are handing out subsidies as a State it’s still not a good deal unless the energy is reliable even in once every 10 year storms. Why the decision making machine broke down in Texas will be interesting.
 

[Boat + 1,323]

2 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

We buy insurance for everything we need to protect aynd can afford. I can think of nothing better to buy insurance for than grids that are locally based but on a large grid also. They must be reduntantly powerful, use inexpensive energy and be affordable.

I do not see many Americans, or many other nationalities, willing to give up the power they need once they are used to it. Possibly that is due to the power companies not being willing to reward them adequately for making sacrifices. 

The question is what will a "bullet proof" grid cost. I am talking EMP proof, terrorist proof, weather proof, etc. It is the most important part of our grid, along with our internet, telephone, radio, and other electronic systems. Imagine if our credit cards became useless and our transactions could not be processed. Cash would not be available. One good reason to store some, safely, right now and not in just one place. 

I am considering hardening my own grid with propane for heat and electrical generation. It is probably the cheapest insurance I can buy. Gasoline stations rarely have gernerators to pump with in emergencies. I think that should become a legal requirement for licensure. 

Comments?

Well outside the box I would say we can’t be protected. Only a few data bases poofed and were in serious trouble. Only a few chip manufacturers poofed and bingo were offline again. We blow most of our cash on the military but nobody can stop a hypersonic missile. Our response? Let’s rebuild the navy. The only thing we can do is retaliate but that won’t bring society back.

[RichieRich216 + 454]

Recent news articles suggest that solar energy farms in the Sarhara Desert would create more warming for the World do to the fact the panels discharge heat they can not process thus heating up the sand below the panel farm’s to extreme temperatures! All the bullshit about proven science on renewable is just that Bullshit.

Most educated and uneducated people have no knowledge to the extent Fossil Fuels play into everyday life, From Cosmetics, Products used in hospitals on patients to the classified military use! 
 

All you greenies go a pair and get over it, we have decades of large reserves and more being discovered weekly! If you think the few will overwhelm the masses that want plentiful, sustainable, cheap energy Good Luck and go hug a tree to get over it! If a guy find a knothole if a girl find a broken branch, all you transsexual’s pick any of the above. But please already and DSAF and shut the fuck up.

[turbguy + 1,540]

21 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

We buy insurance for everything we need to protect aynd can afford. I can think of nothing better to buy insurance for than grids that are locally based but on a large grid also. They must be reduntantly powerful, use inexpensive energy and be affordable.

I do not see many Americans, or many other nationalities, willing to give up the power they need once they are used to it. Possibly that is due to the power companies not being willing to reward them adequately for making sacrifices. 

The question is what will a "bullet proof" grid cost. I am talking EMP proof, terrorist proof, weather proof, etc. It is the most important part of our grid, along with our internet, telephone, radio, and other electronic systems. Imagine if our credit cards became useless and our transactions could not be processed. Cash would not be available. One good reason to store some, safely, right now and not in just one place. 

I am considering hardening my own grid with propane for heat and electrical generation. It is probably the cheapest insurance I can buy. Gasoline stations rarely have gernerators to pump with in emergencies. I think that should become a legal requirement for licensure. 

Comments?

I heat with nat gas.  Also, I'm on a single well and septic system.  We are supplied from taps from two large pipelines running adjacent to the Union Pacific's main line.  I have an auto-start, auto-transfer 14 KW Generac (nat gas fired) , reduced to about 10 KW due to my altitude.  Everything important still works during an electrical outage (which are kinda frequent on "ranch power").  Nat gas outages are RARE.  When you have them, they are REALLY a pain to recover from. Each residence has to be visited by a Gas Co. rep to start it back up, one residence at a time per rep.

Fortunately, there's only a couple handfuls of residences on our tap.

I have AC,but only run it a handful of hours per year (some of that is just to check it out, the rest is to avoid wildfire smoke in the house).  The Generac is too small to operate the AC.

BTW, the Generac is dual fuel (nat gas or propane).

 

Edited February 27, 2021 by turbguy

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 hour ago, turbguy said:

Mary J. Hutzler is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Energy Research (IER).

"The IER is the successor organization to the Institute for Humane Studies of Texas, an advocacy group established in 1984 by billionaire businessman and political donor Charles Koch.^[2] After failing to pay the Texas state franchise tax, IHST lost its charter in 1989, and was later rebranded as the Institute for Energy Research, or IER, under the presidency of Robert L. Bradley Jr., the former director of public policy analysis for Enron.^["

^{Hmmm, maybe just a touch bit o' bias?  ENRON???  There's a rather trustworthy outfit, no?} 

^{Nothing as reliable as an opinion from a lobbyist.}

^{All that being said, I would never advocate or support 100% renewable power at this time, unless it had a significant hydro component.  It's still "too new".  If Georgetown wanted to get close to it, instead of a huge battery, I would have bought/installed 10-20MW of duel-fuel Wartsila, dusted off my hands and said "OK mother nature, bring it on"!}

^{Not sure, but I think you can fuel them with peanut oil...}

I think we should buy canola oil at a discount from a Maine distributor. 

[turbguy + 1,540]

27 minutes ago, Boat said:

I am not in favor of wind turbines or any energy being installed on the cheap. I do favor wind and solar but only if they are cost competive. As a state due diligence by doing your research is just smart business. So while one may root for the future of an industry and the demise of another, logically you look for what’s practical. 
Wind would be how much more expensive with weatherization? Would developers have gone with deals or nixed them. This should not be that hard to figure out.
States and the federal government are two different entities. If the feds are handing out subsidies as a State it’s still not a good deal unless the energy is reliable even in once every 10 year storms. Why the decision making machine broke down in Texas will be interesting.
 

Wouldn't it be ""interesting" if Wind Farm developers were required to also install (or fund) a certain amount of storage capacity to support their project?

[ronwagn + 6,290]

5 minutes ago, turbguy said:

I heat with nat gas.  Also, I'm on a single well and septic system.  We are supplied from taps from two large pipelines running adjacent to the Union Pacific's main line.  I have an auto-start, auto-transfer 14 KW Generac (nat gas fired) , reduced to about 10 KW due to my altitude.  Everything important still works during an electrical outage (which are kinda frequent on "ranch power").  Nat gas outages are RARE.  When you have them, they are REALLY a pain to recover from. Each residence has to be visited by a Gas Co. rep to start it back up, one residence at a time.

Fortunately, there's only a couple handfuls of residences on our tap.

BTW, the Generac is dual fuel (nat gas or propane).

 

My decorative heating stove sits under a cracked window about 12 feet from where I sit at my laptop watching TV most of the time. It heats my whole house in winter. It only heats the bedrooms to about 62 degrees at night so we bundle up and turn it off. I don't trust any open flame. We keep the other half of the house around 70 in winter. It is dual fuel propane nat gas also. We are in central Illinois. It was  a cold winter and is just now warming up. 

We spend more for air conditioning than heating but are extravagant on that, keeping the house at about 68. I often wonder if I would be better off with a natural gas air conditioner, but worry about good service availability.  Maybe some of them are dual fuel. 

We are about twenty miles from a natural gas pipeline and booster station to keep it moving. I don't know the proper name. 

[Boat + 1,323]

Now Richie, I told you not put those panels in the desert. Camels don’t need solar. I warned you about looking for science on those weird porn sites to. And don’t worry about going electric. There is no money in electric 4 wheelers with camo on logging roads.

[turbguy + 1,540]

11 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

My decorative heating stove sits under a cracked window about 12 feet from where I sit at my laptop watching TV most of the time. It heats my whole house in winter. It only heats the bedrooms to about 62 degrees at night so we bundle up and turn it off. I don't trust any open flame. We keep the other half of the house around 70 in winter. It is dual fuel propane nat gas also. We are in central Illinois. It was  a cold winter and is just now warming up. 

We spend more for air conditioning than heating but are extravagant on that, keeping the house at about 68. I often wonder if I would be better off with a natural gas air conditioner, but worry about good service availability.  Maybe some of them are dual fuel. 

We are about twenty miles from a natural gas pipeline and booster station to keep it moving. I don't know the proper name. 

I was also considering a pellet stove (or two), but did not want to burden the wife with hauling pellets.

Some folks here heat primarily with wood stoves (backed up with electric heat).  That adds a certain aroma and patina to the residence.

Are pellets "renewable energy"?

Edited February 27, 2021 by turbguy

[Boat + 1,323]

9 minutes ago, turbguy said:

Wouldn't it be ""interesting" if Wind Farm developers were required to also install (or fund) a certain amount of storage capacity to support their project?

I don’t know if your interested but there are battery storage projects around the world up to 350 MW. Some context. Musk built one in Australia a couple years ago 100 MW. At the time 50 MW was the worlds largest.

Batteries will be the new hate topic soon. In Texas there will be no weatherization so expect failure and rejection. 

[Boat + 1,323]

3 minutes ago, turbguy said:

I was also considering a pellet stove (or two), but did not want to burden the wife with hauling pellets.

Some folks here heat primarily with wood stoves (backed up with electric heat).  That adds a certain aroma and patina to the residence.

Are pellets "renewable energy"?

Some say so but in BC I read their cutting down ancient old growth Forrest for pellets so others say no. Not every pellet is equal.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

9 hours ago, Dan Warnick said:

Sounds very ...............Communal.  Dan, respectfully, I've read enough of your comments to believe your intentions are more or less pure, if not overly hopeful.  Call me skeptical, but I see a lot of room for nefarious manipulation of said systems by those who control the controls.  Go along with the (insert Communal Order here) or you might find your house suffering from a "glitch" that one cannot find anyone to explain sufficiently.

Put enough control of your life into the Commune (a nice quote taken from a Quora commenter)...

"The disadvantages are that there have to be rules, or people argue and then fight or refuse to do work a certain way, or share money. People can’t agree on who will make the rules, or how to interpret them exactly, or how to enforce them, or what to do if someone breaks them."

...and the Commune turns into a dictatorship by necessity, with those who feel "forced" into leadership positions meting out Communal punishments.  My take: No thanks.  I prefer the freedom to provide for my own and I believe humanity will overcome the planet's difficulties; not that the planet is somehow going to stop functioning "someday soon", i.e. within the next 1,000 years.

Of course, that's just my opinion.  You are free to feel otherwise.

Automatic demand response is not "communal". This system is already in use at the industrial level. The difference is that with the advent of super-inexpensive communications and computing, it can be implemented all the way down to the level of individual appliances. This brings the opportunity to participate down to the consumer level. This can be implemented as a totally unregulated market in the same way that Texan consumers were allowed to pick cost-saving market-based rate plans. No "community" is needed. the consumers can continuously and automatically bid for available electricity on a second-by-second basis, and each consumer can pick any algorithm and use any in-home control system to implement the algorithm. This is a whole heck of a lot less "communal" than smartphones or Alexa.

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 minute ago, turbguy said:

I was also considering a pellet stove (or two), but did not want to burden the wife with hauling pellets.

Some folks here heat primarily with wood stoves (backed up with electric heat).

Are pellets "renewable energy"?

Yes, pellet stoves are considered renewable and added to the total of renewables as does ethanol, biodiesel, biogas etc. It does depend on who is doing the figuring. They also consider hydro renewable and it throws the figures way off.  Each needs to be recognized for what it achieves separately. 

I used to have a corn stove and lived a block from an elevator. It turned out to be a bad idea because the corn price went way up (About 2 to 7 dollars) when they started making ethanol and then natural gas went way down when they started fracking. Corn was less expensive to burn than pellets for several years.  I would rather have a wood burning stove and possibly use pellets on a special rack if I needed to. Right now I have a faux fireplace (electric) in my multipurpose room and could put it there. I have huge Burr oaks that shed a lot of branches and have had to give away a couple of trees because of the danger they posed to my home. They could have made great lumber but somebody got a lot of firewood for the trouble of cutting them up. 

In Europe they Pollard (cut branches off) certain types of trees every year and burn them. It is more efficient than cutting down whole trees if you have small acreage. 

[Wombat + 1,028]

On 2/16/2021 at 4:43 AM, RichieRich216 said:

I am willing to bet these Greenies didn’t see this coming! The world needs to pause by all the assholes pushing Green Agenda’s! The world has tens of decades of cheap fossil fuels and I’m quite sure with all of the technology breaking at record speeds they if they desire can use and process it more efficient!

I heard that all the gas stations in Texas were closed due to the blackouts? And that NG production HALVED due to the storm? Hydrogen is a better alternative to fossil fuels:

Toyota’s New Fuel Cell Module Could Be A Gamechanger For Hydrogen | OilPrice.com

[ronwagn + 6,290]

29 minutes ago, Boat said:

Some say so but in BC I read their cutting down ancient old growth Forrest for pellets so others say no. Not every pellet is equal.

Pellets are made from fast growing trees and waste from lumber mills. Not ancient old growth forests. Those were cut down long ago and are preserved today, or should be. Of course in Canada some trees grow very slowly because of the cold weather way up north and away from the coast. I really don't know enough about it, but we need to always conserve large tracts of the most beautiful areas for natural beauty and recreation of all kinds. There is a problem when too much is not made into multiple use that is wisely administered. I think our national parks have far too few facilities for camping and recreation, and too few roads and too little parking. They were originally designed for the wealthy elites to visit.

Edited February 27, 2021 by ronwagn
spelling

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

4 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

Yes, pellet stoves are considered renewable and added to the total of renewables as does ethanol, biodiesel, biogas etc. It does depend on who is doing the figuring. They also consider hydro renewable and it throws the figures way off.  Each needs to be recognized for what it achieves separately. 

I used to have a corn stove and lived a block from an elevator. It turned out to be a bad idea because the corn price went way up (About 2 to 7 dollars) when they started making ethanol and then natural gas went way down when they started fracking. Corn was less expensive to burn than pellets for several years.  I would rather have a wood burning stove and possibly use pellets on a special rack if I needed to. Right now I have a faux fireplace (electric) in my multipurpose room and could put it there. I have huge Burr oaks that shed a lot of branches and have had to give away a couple of trees because of the danger they posed to my home. They could have made great lumber but somebody got a lot of firewood for the trouble of cutting them up. 

In Europe they Pollard (cut branches off) certain types of trees every year and burn them. It is more efficient than cutting down whole trees if you have small acreage. 

"Renewable" is not always "good". biomass is renewable in the sense that it doesn't use much fossil fuel and therefore it removes as much CO2 from the atmosphere as it adds: it's (nearly) "carbon neutral". However, wood burning creates smoke, which has all sorts of problems. Here in the Bay area our biggest concern immediate concern is pollution, not climate change. On high-pollution days, wood burning is banned, with an exemption only for homes with pellet systems as the only heat.

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 minute ago, Wombat said:

I heard that all the gas stations in Texas were closed due to the blackouts? And that NG production HALVED due to the storm? Hydrogen is a better alternative to fossil fuels:

Toyota’s New Fuel Cell Module Could Be A Gamechanger For Hydrogen | OilPrice.com

Natural gas is far less expensive than hydrogen and safer and more abundant. Global warming AKA  climate change is a myth. 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

This just came over on my LinkedIn feed (notice the guy who Liked it, at the top?):

[ronwagn + 6,290]

2 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

"Renewable" is not always "good". biomass is renewable in the sense that it doesn't use much fossil fuel and therefore it removes as much CO2 from the atmosphere as it adds: it's (nearly) "carbon neutral". However, wood burning creates smoke, which has all sorts of problems. Here in the Bay area our biggest concern immediate concern is pollution, not climate change. On high-pollution days, wood burning is banned, with an exemption only for homes with pellet systems as the only heat.

Your worst pollution occurs due to poor forest management caused fires when the wind blows your way. Most of your pollution ends up in the Central Valley due to prevailing winds. It is true that fire stoves don't work for densely populated areas like the bay area. They are great for less densely populated areas. 

[Wombat + 1,028]

5 minutes ago, Wombat said:

I heard that all the gas stations in Texas were closed due to the blackouts? And that NG production HALVED due to the storm? Hydrogen is a better alternative to fossil fuels:

Toyota’s New Fuel Cell Module Could Be A Gamechanger For Hydrogen | OilPrice.com

A red arrow? That ain't like you Ron! Don't worry, I will ignore it on account of all the great discussions we have had, knowing full well your passion for NG  

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

5 minutes ago, Wombat said:

A red arrow? That ain't like you Ron! Don't worry, I will ignore it on account of all the great discussions we have had, knowing full well your passion for NG  

That is unusual for @ronwagn.

What gives, Ron?

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 hour ago, Boat said:

Well outside the box I would say we can’t be protected. Only a few data bases poofed and were in serious trouble. Only a few chip manufacturers poofed and bingo were offline again. We blow most of our cash on the military but nobody can stop a hypersonic missile. Our response? Let’s rebuild the navy. The only thing we can do is retaliate but that won’t bring society back.

You stated the obvious but it is not a valid argument against having the best system we can afford. Ponder not being able to get gasoline or do purchase anything with your credit cards and cash being unavailable at ATM's. People need to realize the economic system we rely on. Remember that when they tell us we don't need cash or to own things.