February 23, 20215 yr 3 hours ago, Texsox said: Third worse blackout in US history. I love Al Franken and like Ted Cruz more than most people and I hate Ted Cruz. If this were the old days you all could read my opinions of Franken, Cruz and Ventura, etc. I've learned my lesson. Ah for the good old days. ... More seriously, glad u and your family members are safe, Tex. My power went off here for 2-3 hours and it's amazing how quickly the place can freeze up. Glad u are OK, Tex. I watched some clips from Austin and the lines to get in a convenience store were around the block. Scary days. Edited February 23, 20215 yr by greg775
February 25, 20215 yr Author https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/24/opinions/texas-electric-power-russo/index.html If Texas were its own country, we would be the world's sixth-largest wind energy producer. Though California is thought to be the leader in renewable energy in the US, Texas has more installed solar and wind capacity. With more solar and wind power projects planned to come online in the next five years than in any other state, our solar power market is about to be Texas-sized as well.
February 26, 20215 yr Author So basically instead of winterizing fossil fuel plants Texas was busy building solar and wind farms which is nice, but those weren't winterized to hundred year freezes either.
February 26, 20215 yr 15 minutes ago, Texsox said: So basically instead of winterizing fossil fuel plants Texas was busy building solar and wind farms which is nice, but those weren't winterized to hundred year freezes either. I'd say that rather than doing either, they were taking profits and using them occasionally to buy other utility providers around the country.
February 26, 20215 yr Author 37 minutes ago, Balta1701 said: I'd say that rather than doing either, they were taking profits and using them occasionally to buy other utility providers around the country. Somehow Texas with all that oil and natural gas became the country's largest producer of renewable energy. In fact if Texas was a country it would be the 6th largest producer of wind and solar energy in the world. Someone invested in those plants to sell electricity.
February 26, 20215 yr 7 minutes ago, Texsox said: Somehow Texas with all that oil and natural gas became the country's largest producer of renewable energy. In fact if Texas was a country it would be the 6th largest producer of wind and solar energy in the world. Someone invested in those plants to sell electricity. As they should be. Wind and sunlight are abundant there. It's far cheaper to build those than to run coal or nuclear plants.
February 26, 20215 yr Author 2 minutes ago, Balta1701 said: As they should be. Wind and sunlight are abundant there. It's far cheaper to build those than to run coal or nuclear plants. Lots of sun and wind in other states also. I think the attraction in Texas was building for 99.9 years of the 100 year weather pattern. Probably why other areas haven't invested that heavily. They are building for a once every 100 year storm.
March 9, 20215 yr Author Because basically anyone can add anything to the Texas power grid now we have Musk fucking with it. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-08/tesla-is-plugging-a-secret-mega-battery-into-the-texas-grid Everyone experiments here. Solar, wind, now AA batteries. Just winterize the coal and natural gas plants like the rest of the country.
June 10, 20214 yr Author The power plants here are designed to shed heat, not retain it as we learned this winter.
June 10, 20214 yr You can still run into issues where plants need to derate due to intake water being too hot. Thermdynamic efficiency is all about that delta T! Or if you simply exceed system capacity by having so many AC units running.
June 11, 20214 yr Author 16 hours ago, StrangeSox said: You can still run into issues where plants need to derate due to intake water being too hot. Thermdynamic efficiency is all about that delta T! Or if you simply exceed system capacity by having so many AC units running. Our San Antonio power company offers free Nest thermostats if the homeowner allows the company to adjust the thermostat during “energy rush hours”. You can over ride the setting from the thermostat but usually it’s people not home. Yesterday they raised ours to 82 which wasn’t bad with close to 100 outside temps. We hadn’t even noticed it until I happened to walk by the thermostat. My point was more this heat wave is something that has happened before and the chances of handling it are much better than a deep freeze down to Brownsville which had never happened before.
June 26, 20214 yr Yeah it’s not Texas but this forecast in the PNW is staggering. Breaking all time high temperatures by 5 degrees F.
July 8, 20214 yr https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/07/07/climate/chicago-river-lake-michigan.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes
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