Massive Texas power outage

[gotbeans]

Also have one of these, idk if you guys ever used one but they're good.. get some stainless steel with iron core or cast iron cuz good sun will melt aluminum pans etc lol
they heat up real fast though. Also deformed one of my cheap thin iron camping pans. So we're getting well above 1000C

Also recommend at least shade 5 sunglasses to block the sun when adjusting it to follow or else you gonna go blind or some light plasma torch /grinding glasses

highly recommend for cooking during tornado outages

 

[gotbeans]

looks like NWS finally released their report or w/e it's called

4 tornadoes hit Benton County Memorial Day Weekend | What we know so far

Although there are only four confirmed tornadoes in Northwest Arkansas at this time, there could be more confirmed tornadoes in the coming days.

www.5newsonline.com

pic below for centerton which is next to rogers
no tornadoes in rogers looks like, but the tornado in centerton was a mile wide.. and the 80-95 mph wind just knocked everything over throughout our entire city and neighboring cities I guess

 

[Zwy]

One has to start wondering what the cost/benefit ratio is for burying some of those lines. I know this comes up a lot and it is always stated how much it costs to bury lines but then it seems like you always eventually have scenarios like this every so often. I mean what is the FULL cost to society in lost productivity, food, electric company overtime work, discomfort, etc. Has someone actually done a full analysis of that? Even my former electric co-op started burying some lines in some heavily treed hilly areas because of the cost to maintain those lines.

Large transmission lines will never be underground so those are still vulnerable. Burying the local utility lines doesn't do much good if major transmission lines are down.

My utility here buried the lines 2 years ago. It is still not up and running. They come and open the boxes, look inside, close the box, drive to next box and repeat the process. This has occurred at least 4 times. Yesterday I actually saw a worker filling out a form for once. It took a year after lines were buried to install the small transformers.

This is not a major line, it runs 4.5 miles from one town to the next. In the one town, the city owns the electrical distribution and none of those 400 residents will get underground service. That town was bypassed. The substation is 0.5 miles from that town. Between that substation and the feed for the town of 650 residents, there are 15 services. Mine is number 2 from the substation. At the edge of that town is a large distribution switching box.

It is a huge clusterf#ck. Overhead poles and wire could have been run 100 times in the time spent on the project. In the next town, I own some property there. You should have heard the rep from the utility squeal about having to install a 3 phase transformer at one commercial property I own. They tried to get me convinced to drop 3 phase. I plainly stated, the service is 3 phase now and it will be 3 phase when you are done.

 

[Oldphile]

Foolish people in NH call for buried power lines. Tree roots and granite everywhere. Not at all practical.

 

[DPC]

Foolish people in NH call for buried power lines. Tree roots and granite everywhere. Not at all practical.

It makes sense on a residential are when building new infrastructure.

Personally I rather be on the ground working on a pad mount transformer than in a bucket truck working on a can.


This is a really old combination of parts.
As long as your under 5000 volts it’s relatively easy to do cable termination.
This is not a 5000 volt installation, and it was not really done to todays standards.
But consider the costs involved in having all the parts and fuses in metal clad enclosers on the ground in switchyards, fences barb wire to keep people out…

Your hydro rates would be higher to reflect the extra parts and steps required to electrify your neighbourhood compared to a pole top system

 

[Kornbread]

Wow, lots of storm mayhem there. West KY got hit pretty bad as well.

So do you have your own power going? If so what kind do you have?

We lost power for a couple hours Sunday, but really didn't notice.

About an ~hour West of you. Locally, as in town, nws confirmed 100mph downbursts, an ef2, and next town down the road was an ef3. Most now have power back. l almost felt bad when everyone else was in the dark and we had electric.

 

[Subdood]

About an ~hour West of you. Locally, as in town, nws confirmed 100mph downbursts, an ef2, and next town down the road was an ef3. Most now have power back.

I'm in NE KY near Morehead, are you an hour east of there, or out in west KY? Because I know there were some big tornadoes last weekend near Dawson Springs. At one time about 300K were without power in that part of the state, must've been some hellacious storms besides the twisters.

I almost felt bad when everyone else was in the dark and we had electric

Me too. Sorta.

 

[Subdood]

yea I posted in my first post everyone has no power except me lol
I only had my shop running, I have 2x https://signaturesolar.com/eg4-3kw-off-grid-inverter-3000ehv-48/
runs everything fine, luckily it's a nice week only 70-80 degrees, can't run AC in the house or dryer but everything else is good.
Right now I just ran an extension cord into the house so it's just 20 amps but the fridge, freezer, some lights, computer and such only use about 1000 watts when they're on.. fridge/freezer turns off most of the time.
I run servers in my shop to run several company things and they've been up the whole time, including during the tornado lmao (only like 300 watts there)

To cook I just unplug the fridge/freezer and then plug in the air fryer or my griddle which pull about 2000 watts peak and go down to like 1800 probably barely under where it'd trip the 20amp breaker.

been fine though, got water and hot water which is far more important than power imo, but also plenty of power

now everyone has generators and holy shit it's annoying
lowes and home depot had like several states ship all their generators here, probably thousands of them up and down the isles on pallets. The entire lumber isles were filled with them and outside filled with them. Tons of people buying them

power is still out

yep I bet, it's worth it just to reduce noise alone lol



here's another one.
There's a street of full power poles laying down, about 10 of them in a row. But every street and I mean literally every street has lines down and poles down. They have about 400 boom trucks parked in the big shopping mall / center and have a mile of the road closed for them to park in at night.
View attachment 218554

I had considered getting a dual fuel generator before I decided on the solar system a couple years ago. Yeah a genny is cheaper but noisier, needs gas, you've got to go out and start it up, run wires, etc. I know some are whole home units like Generac but I didn't want to worry about testing it, refueling it and so on.

I spent a decent amount of cash on my system, but it's pretty much done (barring any additional toys, um I mean equipment).

I may still consider a small genny to charge the batts, but that's low on the priority list.

I'm working on getting my shed switched over to the inverter, should be done soon. We have one freezer in there and I might move another one in there soon.

 

[time2roll]

They tried to get me convinced to drop 3 phase. I plainly stated, the service is 3 phase now and it will be 3 phase when you are done.

All connections should be three phase. Works so much better for higher power items.

 

[dfw_dude]

I had considered getting a dual fuel generator before I decided on the solar system a couple years ago. Yeah a genny is cheaper but noisier, needs gas, you've got to go out and start it up, run wires, etc. I know some are whole home units like Generac but I didn't want to worry about testing it, refueling it and so on.

I spent a decent amount of cash on my system, but it's pretty much done (barring any additional toys, um I mean equipment).

I may still consider a small genny to charge the batts, but that's low on the priority list.

I'm working on getting my shed switched over to the inverter, should be done soon. We have one freezer in there and I might move another one in there soon.

I had it before my solar project - but I do keep a small 3000w dual fuel Pulsar generator in storage along with 2X 20# propane cylinders. Originally had it as emergency measure to (slow) charge my EV if there was every grid problems, and it works all well and good. Now it would be double emergency backup if there was no sun for 2 or 3 days. I'd need to get a chargeverter from EG4 if I wanted to integrate it into my solar/battery setup though since its only 120V output

Propane never goes bad, burns cleaner and don't have to worry about rotating fuel every 6 to 12 months too

 

[740GLE]

It makes sense on a residential are when building new infrastructure.

Personally I rather be on the ground working on a pad mount transformer than in a bucket truck working on a can.

View attachment 218587
This is a really old combination of parts.
As long as your under 5000 volts it’s relatively easy to do cable termination.
This is not a 5000 volt installation, and it was not really done to todays standards.
But consider the costs involved in having all the parts and fuses in metal clad enclosers on the ground in switchyards, fences barb wire to keep people out…

Your hydro rates would be higher to reflect the extra parts and steps required to electrify your neighbourhood compared to a pole top system

It if the majority of the distribution system back bone is 34kv it’s a different world that will never be completely buried.

Sure new developments of >5 homes is all URD but the road side line that’s been in the air for longer than we’ve been alive, it’ll still remain in the air.

 

[Dave911]

If I was living in Texas I would insist on full solar with batteries, plus 1000 gallons of propane and a standby generator. My cousins in TX went through the great freeze a few years ago and its obvious that the grid is not reliable and its mismanaged. They had some major losses. Im in Indiana and we have tornados but major grid downtime is minimal. Even after tornadoes hit. Its supposed to be a "grid" for that reason.

 

[DPC]

It if the majority of the distribution system back bone is 34kv it’s a different world that will never be completely buried.

Sure new developments of >5 homes is all URD but the road side line that’s been in the air for longer than we’ve been alive, it’ll still remain in the air.

Yes
But I don’t see a lot of urban areas with much over 13.8
Your area might be different

 

[Kornbread]

I'm in NE KY near Morehead, are you an hour east of there, or out in west KY? Because I know there were some big tornadoes last weekend near Dawson Springs. At one time about 300K were without power in that part of the state, must've been some hellacious storms besides the twisters.


Me too. Sorta.

Oh heck, I read your location wrong and mistook NE for NW Kentucky. We're in the very East part of MO, where that stuff picked up steam and headed towards KY, IL, and TN.

Don't get me wrong, having power was nice, cold showers not so much, but yeah, felt a tad bit guilty. Turned off all outside lights and pulled the curtains.

 

[Subdood]

Oh heck, I read your location wrong and mistook NE for NW Kentucky. We're in the very East part of MO, where that stuff picked up steam and headed towards KY, IL, and TN.

Don't get me wrong, having power was nice, cold showers not so much, but yeah, felt a tad bit guilty. Turned off all outside lights and pulled the curtains.

Ok, you're near New Madrid then? Gotta love those earthquakes to go along with storms. We got the remnants of that nasty system Sunday night, just some rain, no real storms. It seems like when those roll in from the flatter western part of the state, they seem to fizzle out when they hit here in the foothills.

Yeah, I've told a few of our neighbors and relatives about our system, but probably should have kept quiet about it. We're in a rural setting so our nearest neighbor is about quarter mile away, and that's our niece and nephew. Not too worried about the neighbors, they're good people.

Working on putting the hot water tank on a DPDT switch to run it on the inverter when the grid goes down, but only if the sun's out and batts are charged. It would be 120V not 240V, but it would help some, and be a good power dump when it's sunny.

 

[740GLE]

Yes
But I don’t see a lot of urban areas with much over 13.8
Your area might be different

Even then burning in urban areas is probably more difficult, sewer, water, gas lines then sidewalk/road ways stop lights.

Also don’t forget even if it’s URD, it still has a life span and must be replaced/maintained, so it’s expensive to install and causes long duration outages at a premium to fix.

Again something easily said but hard to execute.

 

[gotbeans]

Foolish people in NH call for buried power lines. Tree roots and granite everywhere. Not at all practical.

also with high voltage they can't just bury lines. They actually put them through conduit with oil insulation (like mineral oil) to keep them cool and not jumping into the ground and have to pump it constantly to keep it cooling. They ones way in the air just do that passively

 

[DPC]

also with high voltage they can't just bury lines. They actually put them through conduit with oil insulation (like mineral oil) to keep them cool and not jumping into the ground and have to pump it constantly to keep it cooling. They ones way in the air just do that passively

They make high voltage teck
I use it all the time
See photo previous
8kv teck and wire armoured marine cable

 

[EastTexCowboy]

Was just visiting the weather channel and saw that over 1 million customers without power in the Houston area from severe thunderstorms, most of those (+800K ) are in Harris county alone, comes out to about 40% of customers are without power.

The storms are moving into extreme SE Texas, and Louisiana, so expecting more outages there.

I don't think I've seen so many outages in such a short time, outside of a hurricane. Most of the damage seems to be from +70mph straight line winds. There was also a unconfirmed tornado. Widespread damage obviously, even some skyscrapers had windows blown out.

Makes me wonder if my array could handle such winds. But, we have had 60mph winds, and my ground mount seemed to handle it okay.

Any SE Texas forum members want to report in? Maybe @EastTexCowboy?

Better late responding than never?

It was a little windy here during the bad storm back when you first posted this. We probably had 75 mph winds but no significant damage. We did get a ton of rain over about a week there, something over 20 inches with a lot of local flooding. We fared okay on that as well, although some pastures under water. For the most part our solar held the line. I did have to run the chargeverter a few times when it rained with no sun for a couple days in a row.

But we got another storm with worse winds on Tuesday. The weather geeks said 85 mph winds. Having been through a number of hurricanes it felt like we had some gusts pushing 100. But we still fared well. A little damage to the gardens and a tree down at the lake house but it didn't fall on anything. All the panels were fine through both storms so we're back to making kws.

As for other folks around here, there are a lot of them suffering. Livingston flooded in town in places which had never flooded. South of us the rising water from dam release set new records so a lot of flooding there too. During Hurricane Harvey the dam release reached 110k cfs, which set a record at the time. During this storm it got up to 124k cfs, so considerably more than ever before. And the power outages in Houston with all the transmission lines down has been a little crazy. No fun to be without power for weeks when you're having heat indexes of 108F or more.

All in all, I'm going to say we were very fortunate. The grid didn't fail here like it did in Houston but it was great to be on solar, just in case it did.

 

[cs1234]

No fun to be without power for weeks when you're having heat indexes of 108F or more.

Sucks if it's hot, sucks if it's cold. You want it to be just right.

 

[EastTexCowboy]

Sucks if it's hot, sucks if it's cold. You want it to be just right.

Yeah, pretty much! We've all gotten soft over the last few generations, including mine. I mean, I'm still out working in it most of the time, but I whine about it.

 

[cs1234]

Yeah, pretty much! We've all gotten soft over the last few generations, including mine. I mean, I'm still out working in it most of the time, but I whine about it.

Hey, it's different when you're getting paid for it. I don't get a discount on my mortgage or property taxes when my house is essentially a squatters camp with no power.

 

[gotbeans]

They make high voltage teck
I use it all the time
See photo previous
8kv teck and wire armoured marine cable

bottom of the ocean is slightly colder than 2 ft under roads

 

[DPC]

bottom of the ocean is slightly colder than 2 ft under roads

This is 800 feet below sea level, bone dry and 85f

This one is 900 feet above sea level, but 500 feet below ground and colder than a well diggers arse….


Figure that out….

 

[gotbeans]

under something != bottom of it
also doesn't have the overheating issues our power lines do