Stay Warm and Safe the Next Few Days

[MaduroBU]

AS of today, the month of February has cost me $150 for 267 kwh. $12 of that is a Visa fee (Griddy will only take credit card payments, and I'm using this rough patch for them to beat the drum for ACH again). Given the challenges that others have faced, I consider myself very lucky.

[puma guy]

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

El Paso was one o’ those areas, but it wasn’t as cold and it didn’t last as long as the cold in the middle of the state. There were public warnings and requests to conserve power from El Paso Electric Co. Also, I don’t think we’re as dependent on wind and solar.

ERCOT outages affected the entire area of coverage regardless of temperatures and conditions. The non ERCOT providers weren't relying on 42% wind generation that virtually disappeared ( down to 8%) putting the entire load on the remaining mostly natural gas and some coal generating plants which became overloaded. You can't loose 34% of your power generation all at once and survive. The crap about natural gas freezing is just that -crap. The freeze point of Methane (natural gas) is -295°F and the vapor point is -258°F. Frozen natural gas didn't happen. There could have been issues with the system controls, but that's not what is being stated as the problem. It's all spin to take the heat of green energy sources. AOC is too ignorant to realize her comment about Texas rejecting the Green New Deal is probably the stupidest utterance in her career. Texas leads the US in all Green Energy and we have 30% of all wind generation in the entire United States.

[MaduroBU]

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

El Paso was one o’ those areas, but it wasn’t as cold and it didn’t last as long as the cold in the middle of the state. There were public warnings and requests to conserve power from El Paso Electric Co. Also, I don’t think we’re as dependent on wind and solar.

ERCOT outages affected the entire area of coverage regardless of temperatures and conditions. The non ERCOT providers weren't relying on 42% wind generation that virtually disappeared ( down to 8%) putting the entire load on the remaining mostly natural gas and some coal generating plants which became overloaded. You can't loose 34% of your power generation all at once and survive. The crap about natural gas freezing is just that -crap. The freeze point of Methane (natural gas) is -295°F and the vapor point is -258°F. Frozen natural gas didn't happen. There could have been issues with the system controls, but that's not what is being stated as the problem. It's all spin to take the heat of green energy sources. AOC is too ignorant to realize her comment about Texas rejecting the Green New Deal is probably the stupidest utterance in her career. Texas leads the US in all Green Energy and we have 30% of all wind generation in the entire United States.

My understanding is that the amount of water vapor in the natural gas going through the pipelines was high enough to be a problem at very low temperatures, thus the clogs were dependent upon the freezing temperature of water, not the gas itself.

[Rafe]

Well, this'll teach me to open a topic about upcoming bad weather. I think I jinxed myself.

We lost power at 02:05 Monday and were without for almost 76 hours straight. Gas fireplace was the only source of heat. Thermometer said we hit 32 inside the house for a few hours. Lost water about 05:00 Wednesday and thought the main supply line had frozen because we lost water to all faucets at the same time. Went out into the 9-degree tundra and shut-off the valve at the meter. Turned out the MUD had turned off the water intentionally due to very low pressure and so they could switch over to a single operating plant from two. Water was off for about 90 minutes. And how did the MUD notify us of this? They posted it on their website instead of emailing or alert-texting customers. Neighbor across the street who had internet from a satellite provider told us about the water on Friday morning. Turned the supply line back on and, sure enough, after the typical spitting and hissing, stuff started flowing. At least we had no pipe bursts. AT&T got our internet service back up about noon today, Saturday.

We were very lucky. Other than one large pine tree limb that gave up the ghost under the weight of some ice (didn't fall on the house or hit any cars, and frankly wasn't looking too healthy to begin with) it doesn't seem--so far--like we sustained any physical damage. But in terms of power and plumbing, this was worse than either Hurricane Ike or Hurricane Harvey.

[philip964]

Well, this'll teach me to open a topic about upcoming bad weather. I think I jinxed myself.

We lost power at 02:05 Monday and were without for almost 76 hours straight. Gas fireplace was the only source of heat. Thermometer said we hit 32 inside the house for a few hours. Lost water about 05:00 Wednesday and thought the main supply line had frozen because we lost water to all faucets at the same time. Went out into the 9-degree tundra and shut-off the valve at the meter. Turned out the MUD had turned off the water intentionally due to very low pressure and so they could switch over to a single operating plant from two. Water was off for about 90 minutes. And how did the MUD notify us of this? They posted it on their website instead of emailing or alert-texting customers. Neighbor across the street who had internet from a satellite provider told us about the water on Friday morning. Turned the supply line back on and, sure enough, after the typical spitting and hissing, stuff started flowing. At least we had no pipe bursts. AT&T got our internet service back up about noon today, Saturday.

We were very lucky. Other than one large pine tree limb that gave up the ghost under the weight of some ice (didn't fall on the house or hit any cars, and frankly wasn't looking too healthy to begin with) it doesn't seem--so far--like we sustained any physical damage. But in terms of power and plumbing, this was worse than either Hurricane Ike or Hurricane Harvey.

Well so far your holding the record. I never said a thing about no outage for fear of changing my luck.

[Pawpaw]

Energy expert debunks green narrative on Texas

SPOILER ALERT: Wind power let us down, bigtime.

[Chemist45]

puma guy wrote:

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

So I guess the three days I was without power was a fluke?
I call bull.

[FrogFan]

We lost power at 02:05 Monday and were without for almost 76 hours straight.

Well here I was thinking we had lost power longer than anyone in Texas -- from 8:00 Monday morning until 11:00 Thursday morning, 75 hours. You were out an hour longer than we were. We spent two nights in area hotels and one night at my daughter's house. We had a burst pipe at the washing machine but were home and cut the water at the street quickly enough to avoid a serious problem. Several taps froze in the house and wouldn't shut off, those are repaired now. Pool is frozen. No visible damage yet but a couple tiles fell off. I won't know until it completely thaws if I have more serious damage.

[puma guy]

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

El Paso was one o’ those areas, but it wasn’t as cold and it didn’t last as long as the cold in the middle of the state. There were public warnings and requests to conserve power from El Paso Electric Co. Also, I don’t think we’re as dependent on wind and solar.

ERCOT outages affected the entire area of coverage regardless of temperatures and conditions. The non ERCOT providers weren't relying on 42% wind generation that virtually disappeared ( down to 8%) putting the entire load on the remaining mostly natural gas and some coal generating plants which became overloaded. You can't loose 34% of your power generation all at once and survive. The crap about natural gas freezing is just that -crap. The freeze point of Methane (natural gas) is -295°F and the vapor point is -258°F. Frozen natural gas didn't happen. There could have been issues with the system controls, but that's not what is being stated as the problem. It's all spin to take the heat of green energy sources. AOC is too ignorant to realize her comment about Texas rejecting the Green New Deal is probably the stupidest utterance in her career. Texas leads the US in all Green Energy and we have 30% of all wind generation in the entire United States.

My understanding is that the amount of water vapor in the natural gas going through the pipelines was high enough to be a problem at very low temperatures, thus the clogs were dependent upon the freezing temperature of water, not the gas itself.

I haven't seen that information. Do you have a link to any info regarding that? The refinery I worked in imported billions of cubic feet of natural gas in weather ranging from 105° to 8-9° and never had problems. I worked in the utility department that monitored the entire fuel system of a 325M Bbl/Day refinery and we never have any occurrences such as the ones you describe. I'm trying to understand why water in methane would be vaporized. I don't know about power plants, but every refinery I've been in has knock out pots to catch any condensates in gas systems. Our system combined gas produced during the refining process with natural gas and there was a much greater possibility of having condensible constituents and no fuel control valves ever froze up/clogged up in sub freezing weather. But I am interested in learning if what occurred.

[puma guy]

puma guy wrote:

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

So I guess the three days I was without power was a fluke?
I call bull.

I didn't say all outages were short. Just as there were people in ERCOT covered areas who never lost power I'm sure as in your case there are exception. Look it up yourself.

[srothstein]

puma guy wrote:

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

So I guess the three days I was without power was a fluke?
I call bull.

For the area served by ERCOT, mine were about the average I would say. Luling is a municipal utility, so we are not deregulated to have choice of provider. The wholesaler to the city is Bluebonnet Co-op, so no one in our area is deregulated. Our power was out for about 5 or 6 hours on Sunday, then for 15 minutes at a time, about once every three hours, from Monday through Wednesday. Those were the rolling blackouts.

Bad news was we lost water on Wednesday at about 9:00 a.m. City says that there were so many leaks in lines that all three water towers in the city emptied before they could get it all shut off. They spent three days 24 hours each trying to repair leaks and even brought in contractors to help on Thursday. The water came back on at about 1:30 p.m. Friday. Then at about 3:30. I got a notice saying that the apartment was trying to fix leaks and only had water to three of the buildings but were working on the rest. I was in one of the lucky three. But now I don't know whether to blame the city or the apartment complex for being without water. I am leaning towards both.

[MaduroBU]

The areas Texas not covered by ERCOT were barely affected. Most outages were short: minute to a few hours. Very, very interesting.

El Paso was one o’ those areas, but it wasn’t as cold and it didn’t last as long as the cold in the middle of the state. There were public warnings and requests to conserve power from El Paso Electric Co. Also, I don’t think we’re as dependent on wind and solar.

ERCOT outages affected the entire area of coverage regardless of temperatures and conditions. The non ERCOT providers weren't relying on 42% wind generation that virtually disappeared ( down to 8%) putting the entire load on the remaining mostly natural gas and some coal generating plants which became overloaded. You can't loose 34% of your power generation all at once and survive. The crap about natural gas freezing is just that -crap. The freeze point of Methane (natural gas) is -295°F and the vapor point is -258°F. Frozen natural gas didn't happen. There could have been issues with the system controls, but that's not what is being stated as the problem. It's all spin to take the heat of green energy sources. AOC is too ignorant to realize her comment about Texas rejecting the Green New Deal is probably the stupidest utterance in her career. Texas leads the US in all Green Energy and we have 30% of all wind generation in the entire United States.

My understanding is that the amount of water vapor in the natural gas going through the pipelines was high enough to be a problem at very low temperatures, thus the clogs were dependent upon the freezing temperature of water, not the gas itself.

I haven't seen that information. Do you have a link to any info regarding that? The refinery I worked in imported billions of cubic feet of natural gas in weather ranging from 105° to 8-9° and never had problems. I worked in the utility department that monitored the entire fuel system of a 325M Bbl/Day refinery and we never have any occurrences such as the ones you describe. I'm trying to understand why water in methane would be vaporized. I don't know about power plants, but every refinery I've been in has knock out pots to catch any condensates in gas systems. Our system combined gas produced during the refining process with natural gas and there was a much greater possibility of having condensible constituents and no fuel control valves ever froze up/clogged up in sub freezing weather. But I am interested in learning if what occurred.

I'll look for the link and try to post it, though the source was not sufficiently technical to provide good details. My assumption is that the circumstances that you encoutered are exactly what happens in chemical plants and refineries, but that unscrupulous producers who knew that their product would go straight to a combined cycle plant that wouldn't know or care allowed them to take short cuts. I.e. "we got most of the water out, and it's going straight into a turbine regardless." If the walls of the pipeline are even in the 20sF that is probably fine, but if you get that pipe cold enough then the water vapor starts condensing and can lock valves and block pipes. The really odd parallel to that is the USS Thresher: The use of silver brazing vs welding caused a critical pipe failure near test depth, but the sub was unable to blow its tanks because the valves froze due to water vapor in the pressurized air tanks freezing on the control valves.

[MaduroBU]

Energy expert debunks green narrative on Texas

SPOILER ALERT: Wind power let us down, bigtime.

I think that it's a reminder of what role renewables play: they're free energy, but they are not reliable. We have sufficient fossil fuel backups on paper, but every type, including the nukes, failed. We can and should have the ability to meet our energy needs in the dead of night in a dead calm, but because an alarming fraction of the natural gas and nuclear plants weren't protected against a 10 year event, the backup went down.

[crazy2medic]

I spent 5hrs under my house repairing broken pipes, been without water for 4 days, I think the Electric company owes me for the expense and aggravation of the problem they created because they didn't do their jobs!

[KC5AV]

Energy expert debunks green narrative on Texas

SPOILER ALERT: Wind power let us down, bigtime.

I'm having trouble believing that when there are windmills operating in much more hostile environments. I think it would be better to say that the people who were supposed to make sure the wind generation equipment was winterized and ready for this event let people down.

Maybe I'm wrong.