Texas Power Outage Danger Until June 18th. Texans told to conserve energy!

[ronwagn + 6,290]

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/06/texas-power-grid-operator-ercot-issues-conservation-alert-asks-texans-raise-thermostats-unplug-appliances-avoid-blackouts/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=the-gateway-pundit&utm_campaign=dailypm&utm_content=daily

What is going on? Texans will be mad. 

[turbguy + 1,398]

1 hour ago, ronwagn said:

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/06/texas-power-grid-operator-ercot-issues-conservation-alert-asks-texans-raise-thermostats-unplug-appliances-avoid-blackouts/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=the-gateway-pundit&utm_campaign=dailypm&utm_content=daily

What is going on? Texans will be mad. 

Ahhh...

This?

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is asking Texans to reduce electric use as much as possible today through Friday, June 18. A significant number of forced generation outages combined with potential record electric use for the month of June has resulted in tight grid conditions.

It's hot this week.

The system is also a little more than two seconds behind.  That's an accumulation of imbalance between supply and demand.  They should be able to recover a chunk of it overnight.

I note they are importing about 500 MW through DC ties as well.

The peak is forcast even higher tomorrow.

 

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Eyes Wide Open + 3,539]

26 minutes ago, turbguy said:

Ahhh...

This?

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is asking Texans to reduce electric use as much as possible today through Friday, June 18. A significant number of forced generation outages combined with potential record electric use for the month of June has resulted in tight grid conditions.

It's hot this week.

The system is also a little more than two seconds behind.  That's an accumulation of imbalance between supply and demand.  They should be able to recover a chunk of it overnight.

I note they are importing about 500 MW through DC ties as well.

The peak is forcast even higher tomorrow.

 

Wind power go figure, it would seem Trump was quite right in pointing out windmills or equation of 16th century tech..Next up...Brown out in California!

Pun included no charge.

 

Oops could get Nasty in Texas, Yugley Nasty

China is kicking out more than half the world’s bitcoin miners – and a whole lot of them could be headed to Texas

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/15/chinas-bitcoin-miner-exodus-.html

Edited June 16, 2021 by Eyes Wide Open

[turbguy + 1,398]

4 minutes ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

Wind power go figure, it would seem Trump was quite right in pointing out windmills or equation of 16th century tech..Next up...Brown out in California!

Pun included no charge.

No. 

Significant unexpected forced outages at thermal plants on ERCOT's system, PLUS, it's hot!.

Rotating outages in CA would not surprise me though.

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

9 minutes ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

Wind power go figure, it would seem Trump was quite right in pointing out windmills or equation of 16th century tech..Next up...Brown out in California!

 

Why do you feel the incessant need to lie?

Of the plants offline, about 9,600 megawatts of power, or nearly 80% of the outages, are from thermal power sources, which in Texas are largely natural-gas-fired power plants. That’s several times what ERCOT usually sees offline for thermal generation maintenance during a summer day. Typically, only about 3,600 megawatts of thermal generation are offline this time of year.

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/06/14/texas-power-grid-conserve-ercot/

[turbguy + 1,398]

Also:

 

"We want to make sure that the solutions that have been provided address both the summer weather and the winter weather, and we feel that all of us, as well as leaders of the Public Utilities Commission and ERCOT believe that we have achieved success with regard to weatherizing for both summer and winter," [Gov:] Abbott said at a June 8 press conference.

 

BUT...

 

ERCOT had been anticipating record-breaking electric demand for the summer due to the hot and dry conditions forecast for the upcoming months. It had implemented new summer inspections in an effort to increase public confidence in the grid.  Among the plants that shut down were four that ERCOT said it recently inspected to make sure they would be ready for summer, as many question whether the grid is fully prepared for the months ahead.

 

 

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Eyes Wide Open + 3,539]

17 minutes ago, Jay McKinsey said:

Why do you feel the incessant need to lie?

Of the plants offline, about 9,600 megawatts of power, or nearly 80% of the outages, are from thermal power sources, which in Texas are largely natural-gas-fired power plants. That’s several times what ERCOT usually sees offline for thermal generation maintenance during a summer day. Typically, only about 3,600 megawatts of thermal generation are offline this time of year.

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/06/14/texas-power-grid-conserve-ercot/

No need to lie Jay, LMAO ive been around the best Con's in the business. As I stated earlier I do admire your energy, but a Con is a Con to their core. 

Carry On I marvel at your spin,a true force of nature.

[turbguy + 1,398]

10 hours ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

No need to lie Jay, LMAO ive been around the best Con's in the business. As I stated earlier I do admire your energy, but a Con is a Con to their core. 

Carry On I marvel at your spin,a true force of nature.

If you can generate power using zero fuel, zero water, zero treatment chemistry, and infinitesimal operating emissions, that would be too good to be true, eh?

If it is a "con", it's a VERY popular one.

And, this green line ain't nothin' to sneeze at...

 

 

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

42 minutes ago, turbguy said:

No. 

Significant unexpected forced outages at thermal plants on ERCOT's system, PLUS, it's hot!.

Rotating outages in CA would not surprise me though.

So far, it looks like we (CA) will avoid rotating outages this week. We have not even gotten to the "please conserve energy" state yet. We won't have a problem unless we have several generators go offline unexpectedly as happened in Texas.

However, PG&E has warned that we have increased risk of "fire weather" because of extreme drought combined with high temperatures. It is likely that they will need to do PSPS cutoffs to ensure that they don't get blamed for a wildfire. In past years these did nto happen until late July or August.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

I've been reading the "please conserve" advice that ERCOT has been sending out. I notice that they have not have not recommended that Texans pre-cool their houses during off-peak and then shut off the AC during peak. Do they think Texans are too stupid to do this properly? Pre-cooling is a fairly good ad-hoc energy storage mechanism. Basically, set your thermostat down to about 72 from midnight until 2:00 PM, and turn the AC off entirely from 2:00 PM until midnight.

[turbguy + 1,398]

7 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

So far, it looks like we (CA) will avoid rotating outages this week. We have not even gotten to the "please conserve energy" state yet. We won't have a problem unless we have several generators go offline unexpectedly as happened in Texas.

However, PG&E has warned that we have increased risk of "fire weather" because of extreme drought combined with high temperatures. It is likely that they will need to do PSPS cutoffs to ensure that they don't get blamed for a wildfire. In past years these did nto happen until late July or August.

I've heard that drought is an issue with hydro generation.  That was my trigger.

[notsonice + 1,068]

29 minutes ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

No need to lie Jay, LMAO ive been around the best Con's in the business. As I stated earlier I do admire your energy, but a Con is a Con to their core. 

Carry On I marvel at your spin,a true force of nature.

 

1 hour ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

Wind power go figure, it would seem Trump was quite right in pointing out windmills or equation of 16th century tech..Next up...Brown out in California!

Pun included no charge.

 

 

Trump is wrong again..... Then again he is the worlds biggest con man.......and there are many still waiting for Mexico to pay for the wall.... so many gullible ones out there.

as already posted so you can refresh your thinking

Of the plants offline, about 9,600 megawatts of power, or nearly 80% of the outages, are from thermal power sources, which in Texas are largely natural-gas-fired power plants. That’s several times what ERCOT usually sees offline for thermal generation maintenance during a summer day. Typically, only about 3,600 megawatts of thermal generation are offline this time of year.

“This is unusual for this early in the summer season,” said Woody Rickerson, ERCOT vice president of grid planning and operations, in a statement. He said the grid operator would conduct an analysis to determine why so many units are offline.

Edited June 16, 2021 by notsonice

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 hour ago, turbguy said:

Ahhh...

This?

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is asking Texans to reduce electric use as much as possible today through Friday, June 18. A significant number of forced generation outages combined with potential record electric use for the month of June has resulted in tight grid conditions.

It's hot this week.

The system is also a little more than two seconds behind.  That's an accumulation of imbalance between supply and demand.  They should be able to recover a chunk of it overnight.

I note they are importing about 500 MW through DC ties as well.

The peak is forcast even higher tomorrow.

 

Not enough wind for the turbines?

[turbguy + 1,398]

1 minute ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

I've been reading the "please conserve" advice that ERCOT has been sending out. I notice that they have not have not recommended that Texans pre-cool their houses during off-peak and then shut off the AC during peak. Do they think Texans are too stupid to do this properly? Pre-cooling is a fairly good ad-hoc energy storage mechanism. Basically, set your thermostat down to about 72 from midnight until 2:00 PM, and turn the AC off entirely from 2:00 PM until midnight.

At 7400', I just open my windows after sundown, and close them in the morning ("Laramie" AC).  I use AC only to avoid wildfire smoke.

In Texas, I don't know what people do, but time shifting comfort makes some sense.

Is that a CA practice?

 

[turbguy + 1,398]

10 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

Not enough wind for the turbines?

No, although more wind would help.

Not enough maintenance ($) on the thermal plants.

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Jay McKinsey + 1,489]

1 minute ago, turbguy said:

At 7400', I just open my windows after sundown, and close them in the morning ("Laramie" AC).  I use AC only to avoid wildfire smoke.

In Texas, I don't know what people do, but time shifting comfort makes some sense.

Is that a CA practice?

 

Yes but our power curve goes until much later in the day because of solar. Our peak demand is 5 till 9. The only time we have a shortage is during those hours.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

6 minutes ago, turbguy said:

I've heard that drought is an issue with hydro generation.  That was my trigger.

CA hydro is strange. The dams are managed for irrigation, not for power. While the system is the largest producer of power in the state by far, it is also the largest consumer of electricity, and it consumes more than it produces. They do manage to avoid consumption during peak demand.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

7 minutes ago, turbguy said:

No.

Not enough maintenance on the thermal plants.

Do we know yet? I know ERCOT was surprised by the number of plants offline, but I assumed that the plants were down for planned maintenance before the major high-temperature months of July and August, and they got caught by an unusually early heat wave.

[turbguy + 1,398]

4 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

Do we know yet? I know ERCOT was surprised by the number of plants offline, but I assumed that the plants were down for planned maintenance before the major high-temperature months of July and August, and they got caught by an unusually early heat wave.

"Planned maintenance" are planned generating outages, scheduled with the system operator typically months in advance.

FORCED generating outages are unplanned, unexpected, and are the result of some unanticipated condition (such as sudden boiler tube failure due to erosion, corrosion, or overheating).

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

Maybe all those thermal generators offline in Texas were trying to winterize. Oops

[turbguy + 1,398]

9 minutes ago, Ward Smith said:

Maybe all those thermal generators offline in Texas were trying to winterize. Oops

That would be planned maintenance, not a FORCED outage.  

Not to say that some winterizing activities could be planned and attempted on-line, and as a result, an OOPS occurs due to a management oversight.

Edited June 16, 2021 by turbguy

[Eric Gagen + 713]

6 hours ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

Do we know yet? I know ERCOT was surprised by the number of plants offline, but I assumed that the plants were down for planned maintenance before the major high-temperature months of July and August, and they got caught by an unusually early heat wave.

June is traditionally the start of the cooling season in Texas, and the first major heat wave often comes by mid June.  My 'back of the envelope' guess is that they didn't get their maintenance done as fast as they had projected, and are sweeping that under the rug to avoid another political inquisition.   

[Eric Gagen + 713]

9 hours ago, ronwagn said:

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/06/texas-power-grid-operator-ercot-issues-conservation-alert-asks-texans-raise-thermostats-unplug-appliances-avoid-blackouts/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=the-gateway-pundit&utm_campaign=dailypm&utm_content=daily

What is going on? Texans will be mad. 

I plan not to comply.  They want us to do 78 during the day, and 82 at night.  78 daytime AC temperature I might be able to handle, but 82 at night is estupido, and I can't imagine that anyone will even attempt to comply with that request.  Fortunately yesterday we got a massive soaking rainstorm in the afternoon and late evening, so it was a non issue for us.  

[Eric Gagen + 713]

6 hours ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

I've been reading the "please conserve" advice that ERCOT has been sending out. I notice that they have not have not recommended that Texans pre-cool their houses during off-peak and then shut off the AC during peak. Do they think Texans are too stupid to do this properly? Pre-cooling is a fairly good ad-hoc energy storage mechanism. Basically, set your thermostat down to about 72 from midnight until 2:00 PM, and turn the AC off entirely from 2:00 PM until midnight.

It's too hot here to work. From experience in power outages, or after someone monkeys with the thermostat, or there is an AC unit failure, basically the 'stored' cold air will all warm back up by some time between 5 and 6 pm.  Between then and about 2 hours after sunset, the inside of your house will then heat up above and beyond the outside temperature as a result of continued sunshine, and thermal heat retention from bricks, rooves, trapped hot attic air, etc.  then from midnight until around 10 am your air conditioning will run 100% of the time continuously trying to catch back up. In a worst case scenario, you can actually use more power total in each 24 hour period because you have no short bursts of cool air to maintain the temperature at intervals, and you are trying to do all the cooling at once.  

[turbguy + 1,398]

Texas seems to treat every extreme event as a one-of, high-impact, low-frequency event.

Which says, "We hope it doesn’t happen again".

It's gonna take lots of money and some time to improve the situation.

For residential customers, it might add about $20-$50 per year to their power bills.  It is the large, industrial users (the ones who have much more political influence) who would be paying much larger sums.

Potential solutions that would actually help:

1. Develop and enforce implementation of weatherization at generation facilities

2. Pay for reliability (pay generators to stand-by in spinning reserve)

3. Pay for on-site fuel storage

4. Treat gas supply facilities as critical infrastructure

5. Granularize rotating outages (implement wide-spread demand-side management)

6. Invest in batteries or other storage mechanisms

7. Make communication to the public BLUNT and CLEAR!

Note that I don't list synchronous connection to neighboring grids, although that might help in rare instances.