Posted on 02/20/2021 4:12:59 AM PST by Kaslin
How would your family, and a hundred thousand other families, like to be stuck in your cars for days at minus 16 degrees?
The death toll would be huge. It almost happened in New England in 1989.
And in Texas this week.
I was part of the 1989 Freeze and have some hopefully interesting insights.
In 1989, the weather just before Christmas was terrible. Cold temperature records were set from Texas to New England.
That year, I was responsible for a midcontinent gas gathering system that normally produced about 500 million cubic feet (MMCFD) of natural gas a day. That could supply up to 2 million New England homes. During the 1989 Freeze, we produced 30 MMCFD, roughly a 95% decline. Similar results were happening throughout the Oil Patch. Supply cratered.
Meanwhile, demand for natural gas was exploding, almost literally (more on that below). While the midcontinent temperatures were low enough to freeze gas wells, New England had dangerous arctic temperatures of minus 16 degrees. This created huge natural gas demand for home heating in a major New England town.
The city ultimately weathered that crisis through luck.
Several years later, I was fortunate enough to get to know some of the city's gas utility personnel who were operating the gas grid during the Freeze. They gave me invaluable insights into what really happened. (I promised the operators I would not name the city.)
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
That’s why you never read stories like this where the Amish are incapable of dealing with a sudden deep freeze. Heck — they’d be fine keeping themselves warm just by sleeping with the cows.
Or—choose to live somewhere where it NEVER gets that cold. Scott Adams (Dilbert) did this—once after nearly freezing to death (no coat and a broken down car in upstate NY), he moved to CA so he’d “never again risk death by just going outside.”
My senior son, looking at colleges, has two criteria: 1) in person instruction (how we miss the little things) and 2) “somewhere not too cold.” That means winter high temps in the 50s-60s.
Texas energy people were old a decade ago to winterize power generation.
Texas is now about 24% electricity from wind, and half froze up, so 12% of outage was from wind turbine loss.
If Texas used wind-sourced electricity to keep gas the supply thawed, that was less than genius.
When the big cold front moved through Texas, behind it followed an enormous pool of very cold air. It was in a high pressure center. Those conditions result in no wind for a period of days. It is common.
Some wind turbines may have froze. The biggest problem was there was no wind to spin the turbines.
Wind stopped producing power.
Then there was a huge demand for power, because of the cold.
The system could not handle it, because, as wind power was relied on for more and more power, not enough reserve capacity in nuclear and fossil fuels was built to compensate for the unreliable wind power.
“...of oil heat users who have an electric ignition on the oil burner that stops working during a blackout.”
And how do gas furnaces ignite and blow the warm air?
No, he authorized it.
We do that to our hunting cabin come fall here in Upstate.
still need a generator since you have to run the furnace fan (or the water pump)
If you have your own oil tank, you have a reserve fuel supply. Not dependent on someone else’s system.
I was thinking for here, an earthquake will kill electric as well as gas.
“An insider explains how Texas lost its Power”
“Power”
How the Constitution has lost it’s power.
How the vote has lost its power.
How the States have lost their power.
How school control has lost its power.
How covid businesses have lost their power.
How the Pipeline has lost it’s power.
How the real news has lost it’s power.
How US manufacturing has lost its power.
How the irs has gained it’s power.
How the OBodyMortgagers banking insurance has gained its power
How insurance has gained its power.
How Congress has gained it’s power.
How Fairfax has gained it’s power.
How public children brainwashing compounds have gained their power.
How hospitals have gained their power.
How hospital social workers have gained their power
How Roman’s Chapter One has come into Power.
If your electricity is generated by natural gas, then a gas supply disruption will shut down gas AND oil furnaces.
Coal, baby! (Well in the northeast, anyway.)
“A ton of anthracite, a particularly high grade of coal, can cost as little as $120 near mines in Pennsylvania. The (heat) equivalent amount of heating oil would cost roughly $380, based on the most recent prices in the state and over $470 using prices from December 2007. An equivalent amount of natural gas would cost about $480 at current prices.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/27/business/27coal.html
For 1/3 the price of of oil and 1/4 the price of NG, many in the northeast do still use coal.
“I don’t understand folks not turning their water off and draining the pipes.”
Because that can’t do that with a smart phone app?
When I lived in a cold climate I’d never drive anywhere during the winter months — even in a mostly suburban environment — without my winter camping gear in my vehicle.
a lot of households in Alberta still do as well.
Oil, coal, wood, you can stockpile it.
not dependent on some utility to function competently.
Many people have backup generators hooked up to natural gas. Reading the article, it sounds like that is not as reliable in the scenario described.
He admitted he was young and foolish when he made that decision (drove while in college to a job interview in Feb in upstate NY with no coat).
I’ve been in too many broken down VW situations growing up—on the side of the road, no cell phones in those days—to risk that! I’ve taught my kids that too—even in CA, bring a coat when going out in a car because cars can and do break down.
And solar panels were covered by snow.
you probably could with Google Home - except the power is out...
How much power does it take to keep an oil furnace running? Probably not a very large portion of your normal total usage. Set it up with the option to run off a backup power source and get one large enough for that projected need. Then you’re at risk only if the supply chain for replacement oil or generator fuel goes down too long.
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