Major power surge in NY? (Blackout is in NYC, Detroit, Ottawa and Toronto, per Fox News)

8-14-03 | Joe Hadenuf

[Trust but Verify]

Leave it to a Clinton to try to capitalize politically on her own constituent's misery.

[Peach]

John King, CNN: White House - Bush will speak regarding the power outage.

[mewzilla]

770 AM said this is the largest power outage in US history. 50 million people affected. 9 nuke plants shut down.

[DoctorMichael]

Charlottesville, Virginia checking in..................

Jeeze Louise! I go for an after-work jog, get online, and theres a 1700+ post Thread going on.

".......FNC......"

We've got power here but the damn TV cable is out. Adelphia must be getting their 'feed' from a blacked out area. I'm turning on Savage on the radio.

[hole_n_one]

President Bush to make a statement in about 30 minutes per CNN

[Joe Hadenuf]

Bush will speak regarding the power outage.

Can't imagine what his input will be?

[prairiebreeze]

Breaking!

FOXNews reporting just now that PM Chretian says the primary cause was a lightening strike on a power plant near Niagara Falls.



Prairie

[meyer]

There are contingency plans to keep a simple accident from taking down the whole system, and virutally all the time they work. Sometimes they don't. After the 1965 and 1977 massive East Coast blackouts, there were extensive investigations, just like after a plane crash, (And, yes, there are voice recordings of the various control rooms -- the tapes of the 1977 blackout, largely caused by an operator not following the plan, are hilarious, if not somewhat tragic). Electrical grids are very complex systems, and, in a sense, it is a "miracle" -- caused by human ingenuity every day, that it hangs together 99.99% of the time. We'll see what the after action investigation shows this time. SAMPLE CONVERSATION from 1977: Operator 1: (Not in NYC) -- Yep, he's down the dumper. Operator 2: I told him to shed load -- my needles are all flat (no power going in to NYC). Operator 3: I agree -- he's down the dumper. [The operators were people on the grid operating team, in Maryland, Canada, or whereever, who were trying to feed more power to make up for the loss when lighting took out a connection point north of NYC. The plan called for NYC to blackout some parts of the city, to help out -- However, the big boss was home in Queens, and the on the spot operator was too timid to either take action or call the boss at home -- result -- no load was cut, and NYC dragged the whole system down, as the lost power couldn't be replaced fast enough -- the other suppliers finally had to cut off NYC to keep their own systems from going down, too.]

I'm pretty familiar with the contingency plans - I operate a power system myself. That is why I have seen the gradual decline from maintaining system integrity. Perhaps we need an occasional massive event like this to remind us of why we are supposed to do what is required. I suspect that when the entire sequence of events is put together, there will be some NERC violations around the grid as well as some human error. But the primary cause will most likely be a single contingency that should have been planned for but for some reason wasn't.

I've argued with bosses at a previous employer specifically to prevent this type of thing from happening in my grid on my watch, but in the days of deregulation, companies have little financial incentive to not take greater risks with the grid.

[Peach]

CNN: President Bush to speak at 8:30 pm EST regarding the power outage. Feelings are that a lightening strike caused this problem.

[BohDaThone]

Good summary account of power system, and how power will be restored -- in a general way.

---

How Power Grids Work

By Paul Recer
Associated Press Writer
Thursday, August 14, 2003; 6:31 PM


WASHINGTON –– Electricity generation stations throughout the United States are interconnected in a system called power grids.



This allows electricity generated in one state to be sent to users in another state. It also allows distant power generation stations to provide electricity for cities and towns whose power generators may have failed or been destroyed by some accident or sabotage.

In the U.S. electrical system, there are more than 6,000 power generating units energized with coal, oil, gas, falling water, wind or nuclear fission.

Power from these stations is moved around the country on almost a half-million miles of bulk transmission lines that carry high voltage charges of electricity.

The power transmission is directed by more than 100 control centers. Experts there can monitor the distribution of power and reroute electricity from areas of low demand to areas of high demand. Often there are automatic switches that direct the routing of power to where it is needed.

From the high voltage transmission lines, power goes to regional and neighborhood substations. There, the electricity is stepped down from high voltage to a current that be used in homes and offices.

High or unbalanced demands for power that develop suddenly can upset the smooth distribution of electricity in a grid. In some cases, this can cause a blackout in one section of a grid, or even ripple throughout the whole grid, sequentially shutting down one section after another.

Once large sections of a grid are shut down, it may be difficult or impossible to restore power from neighboring grids. In periods of high demand, such as summer, often those nearby grids also are under stress and may not have spare power.

When power is restored, it can cause a sudden surge in demand that the system may not be able to accommodate. When electric motors, transformers and other electrical devices are all energized at once, it can draw many times the normal load and can trip a secondary shutdown.

For this reason, engineers restore power after a massive blackout in stages, one section after another, so there is no sudden, overwhelming demand.

———

On the Net:

Power grid: www.howstuffworks.com/power.htm

[Rome2000]

We have a closed nuclear plant here in my area of Alabama which the liberals decided was not needed years ago. Maybe they will allow us to complete it so we can send them som power

After Iran and North Korea bomb us, they just might.

[Fitzcarraldo]

http://currentenergy.lbl.gov/

[mewzilla]

The Viking Kitties' litter box need changing ;)

[Mo1]

Thanks

[Joe Hadenuf]

770 AM said this is the largest power outage in US history. 50 million people affected. 9 nuke plants shut down.

Wow....

[Peach]

What is Bush expected to say, for heaven's sakes. It's just for PR, and it's unfortunate the need is felt by the nanny nation to hear from their president when there is a power outage.

[Inspectorette]

Gray Davis just said that the blackout on the East Coast will not affect California.

I am not making it up. I think ABC reported it.

Well, that does it for me! I was gonna vote for recall, but now I've got a new-found confidence in Gray! Phew - what a relief!!!! (Sarcasm off)

[P.O.E.]

Along with Mars being at it's closest

Mars is quite a beautiful sight, right near the moon.

I do admit to wondering if it has anything to do with the heightened "war" activity. Thought did cross my mind that maybe those ancients knew something we've forgotten.

Logically, I don't believe it, but I still wonder sometimes....

[Trust but Verify]

Why bother listening to him? All he's going to do is lie and say there is no reason to believe this a terrorism.

/sarcasm

[Dan from Michigan]

Curfew in Sterling Heights, MI (Macomb County Suburb) 9PM

Applies to EVERYBODY.