Statewide power emergency in Texas: rolling blackouts

[RandomGuy]

Coming soon to your neighborhood.

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/weather/entries/2011/02/02/statewide_power.html

By Claudia Grisales, Tony Plohetski, Ben Wear | Wednesday, February 2, 2011, 09:02 AM

An increase in demand for electricity overnight has forced rolling blackouts across the state, including Austin and Central Texas, utility officials said.

The periodic power shutdowns, which can last between 10 minutes and one hour, have affected traffic signals, businesses and schools, officials said.

The outage requirement is being led by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, the state’s power transmission grid operator, Clark said.

“The locations and durations are determined by the local utilities,” ERCOT spokeswoman Dottie Roark said in a statement. “It is not known at this time how long the need for rotating outages will last.”

An Austin district spokeswoman said some campuses have lost power this morning but that the district is holding classes as scheduled for now.

As of 8 a.m., about a dozen schools did not have power, spokeswoman Roxanne Evans said.

Pease, Wooten and Casis elementary schools were reported to be without power, as well as the district offices on West Sixth Street.

In the Leander school district, classes at Steiner Ranch, Bush and River Ridge elementary schools and Canyon Ridge Middle School will start two hours later because of intermittent electricity in those buildings.

Round Rock school officials said they are on a regular schedule although there have been various outages throughout the district. “We are working right now to identify and provide resources and assistance to campuses if needed,” a district spokeswoman said.

The Killeen district also has announced regular class hours will be observed.

The outages have also affected traffic signals, which should be treated as four-way stops, officials said.

Related story: Central Texas under wind-chill advisory; snow remains in Thursday forecast

The rolling power blackout plan, which began in the Austin area about 5:40 a.m., does not include critical power loads to hospitals and emergency resources, Clark said.

As of 8:45 a.m., Austin-Bergstrom International Airport was reporting 14 cancelled arriving flights, primarily from Chicago, New York, Boston and Dallas Fort Worth. And the airport’s website showed 12 cancelled departures, again involving that same roster of cities.

That list could grow as the day goes on, however, and travelers (or those planning to pick up travelers) should check http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/austinairport/airlines.htm to see what’s up with their particular flights.

Initially, Austin Energy officials projected that outages would last seven minutes, but the outage time was increased 30 to 40 minutes as the power emergency requirements continued.

The rotating outages are initiated when supplies of reserve power are exhausted, ERCOT said.

“Without this safety valve, generators would overload and begin shutting down to avoid damage, risking a domino effect of a region-wide outage,” ERCOT said.

“Consumers and businesses are urged to reduce their electricity use to the lowest level possible,” the statement said.

ERCOT is urging consumers and businesses to follow these steps:

Limit electricity usage to only that consumption which is absolutely necessary. Turn off all unnecessary lights, appliances, and electronic equipment.

Businesses should minimize the use of electric lighting and electricity-consuming equipment as much as possible.

Large consumers of electricity should consider shutting down or reducing non-essential production processes.

Austin fire officials have increased their preparedness level, and firefighters have responded to numerous home and business alarms overnight because of the loss of power.

“We are just busy doing those kinds of things,” Assistant Fire Chief Harry Evans said.

Pedernales Electric Cooperative has decreased the amount of power it distributes to members by 59 megawatts, officials said. The power co-op, which serves more than 230,000 members in more than 20 counties, said it is having rolling 10-minute blackouts throughout its system.

According to John Hurt with the Texas Department of Transportation, stop lights do not have a back-up battery system, meaning when the power is out, the lights go out.

After a power outage, older stop lights will come back online with blinking red lights, and must be reset by hand at the light’s location. Newer models should return to normal functions as soon as power is restored, according to TXDoT.

The state’s power grid system must shed 4,000 megawatts of power, and of that, Austin Energy share of that is about 158 megawatts, Clark said.

“All generators in ERCOT are required to participate - regardless of whether (Austin Energy) has sufficient power in our community, which we do,” Clark said. “This emergency is due to an imbalance in the statewide electric grid between the power being demanded statewide and the generation online at this time.”

The rolling blackouts did not affect the University of Texas’ main campus, which has its own power plant, said Don Hale, a UT spokesman. Austin Energy has assured UT that the Pickle Research Campus in North Austin would be spared from the rolling blackouts to avoid disruption to experiments and other work, Hale said.

Samsung Austin Semiconductor has been assured that its massive manufacturing operations in northeast Austin will not be affected by rolling blackouts around the state.

“It is not affecting us. We will not be impacted,” said company spokeswoman Catherine Morse.

Samsung is by far, Austin’s largest user of electricity and water. Because a power outage could create a very costly disruption in its chip manufacturing operations, Morse said the company has been assured by utility officials that its power will be kept on.

-----------------------------------


Of course, if you are affected, you probably aren't reading this. :lol

[easjer]

Houston's affected too (much of the state is).

Created hideous traffic problems when they shut off power to the Galleria/Loop area during rush hour.

Several HISD schools with no generators had to close and redirect students to other schools.

The CenterPoint spokesperson who was on the 'breaking news' about this was clearly frazzled by it. It was sort of funny the way her voice got very tight and clipped when she kept repeating "Well, it's ERCOT's decision, you'd have to direct that question to ERCOT. It's not a CenterPoint decision, but we'll keep you informed."

[baseline bum]

I remember these in the winter of 2001 in Cali. Power emergencies & rolling blackouts = Enron fraud back then.

[mrsmaalox]

CPS implementing rolling blackouts now, I heard from a friend at I-10 and crossroads they are powerless.

http://www.ksat.com/weather/26708171/detail.html

[CubanMustGo]

Like most of the state, Austin too - Austin Energy has been spreading the pain. I live in the Pedernales Electric Coop service area (Brushy Creek) and we had one for about 15 minutes around 9AM.

Too many damn ppl with electric heaters. :ihit

[slacker77]

Ya,I was out of power around 6 this morning.What really sucks is that this happened while I was in the shower.I had to bring out the candles and flashlights.

[MannyIsGod]

I refuse to believe the state is using more power now than in the hot summer months. Something is wrong. They either have plants offline or something is just fucked up.

[RandomGuy]

Keep in mind a couple of things:

As a system, you have to manage down time for power stations, all very complex systems, to do routine maintenance.

Given that peak electrical demand in Texas is in July-August-September, and low demand is in colder parts of the year, I would guess the most logical time to have units down for yearly maintenance is in colder months.

So I guess we have stations having to operate at lower capacity at the same time you have more stations offline, then get hit by a whammy of demand, it gets ugly.

This is a good argument for distributed power generation, since the problems here seem to be more in the transmission than the generation. (note: about 25% of all electricity in the US is simply wasted due to resistance involved in transmission)

[timvp]

timvp is at HEB right now and the power went out there. So far, everything is fine at home though.

-- Kori

[benefactor]

My wife said the power went out for about 15 minutes this morning while she was getting ready for work. I guess that's what it was.

[gospursgojas]

I refuse to believe the state is using more power now than in the hot summer months. Something is wrong. They either have plants offline or something is just fucked up.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Power-shortage-affects-70-000-CPS-customers-991690.php

This article states CPS as says they have enough power, some other grids in other areas are offline today for matienence.



Lewis said the brownouts were made necessary because a number of plants in other regions of the state were offline for regularly scheduled maintenance.

She stressed that CPS Energy had sufficient energy on hand to meet its customer's electricity demands.

“But ERCOT says that there are not enough power plants (producing energy) to meet the statewide demand,” which triggered the brownouts, she said. “We have been asked to help out other areas of the state that do not have sufficient power.”


CPS was ASKED to start the "brownouts" bc other companies couldn't provide power???? WTF! Unless ERCOT has some kinda state authority, (which I don't know if they do) take care of your PAYING customers first.

[BlackSwordsMan]

Its freezing balls outside.

[spursfan09]

Did the Spurs participate in this last night? I'll blame this loss on a brown out.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

Power just went out where I work :lol Oh well

[SpursWoman]

My daughter is at Judson and text'd me that power was out there. I fear for her life. :( :lol


All of the kids are using the flashlight apps on their phones because a lot of the classrooms don't have windows. Brilliant. :rolleyes :lol


I work right across the street from the airport ... I don't know if we'd be included in the blackouts or not. But we have a huge backup generator so it wouldn't matter for us anyway.

[BlackSwordsMan]

How shitty would it be to be on an airplane right now. Fuck that

[baseline bum]

Someone's making some serious money today.

[jack sommerset]

Our power has gone off 4 times so far. Hard to keep house warm at this rate. It's 12 degrees outside!!!!

[MannyIsGod]

Shorter brownouts would be better because I'd imagine heating a house that had been without heat for an hour would be harder than heating one that was out of power for 10 minutes.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

doesn't it take less energy to heat up homes than it is to cool?

[jack sommerset]

doesn't it take less energy to heat up homes than it is to cool?

I have vaulted ceilings and tons of windows. I have the heat on 72 and it's 59 in here now. It will climb back up to 66-67 and the electricity goes off again and goes down rather fast.

[jeebus]

The power's gone out twice in my apartments today, this last one was for 30 mins or so. Not too bad, I just use the time to clean the place or do whatever plus it stays fairly warm in here..
I dunno why CPS is calling it a brownout; everything is cut off aka a rolling blackout.

[Bito Corleone]

I refuse to believe the state is using more power now than in the hot summer months. Something is wrong. They either have plants offline or something is just fucked up.

This is exactly what has me pissed off. How is it that we don't have the need for these blackout when it will be 100+ degrees for weeks at a time, but the second the temp drops to 20 our power needs to be cut off? Doesn't make any sense to me. :bang

[MannyIsGod]

doesn't it take less energy to heat up homes than it is to cool?

I guess it depends on a lot of things but I'd imagine heating takes less energy.

[Stringer_Bell]

Our power has gone off 4 times so far. Hard to keep house warm at this rate. It's 12 degrees outside!!!!

I was thinking about the safety of the elderly, they might freeze or turn up their heater stuff to dangerous levels not knowing its an actual outage. :(

[BlackSwordsMan]

East side is down.

[RandomGuy]

CPS was ASKED to start the "brownouts" bc other companies couldn't provide power???? WTF! Unless ERCOT has some kinda state authority, (which I don't know if they do) take care of your PAYING customers first.

ERCOT, as the manager of the transmission system does actually have legal authority to order utilities into rolling blackouts to maintain the stability of the entire system.

http://www.ercot.com/


The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) manages the flow of electric power to 22 million Texas customers - representing 85 percent of the state's electric load and 75 percent of the Texas land area. As the independent system operator for the region, ERCOT schedules power on an electric grid that connects 40,000 miles of transmission lines and more than 550 generation units. ERCOT also manages financial settlement for the competitive wholesale bulk-power market and administers customer switching for 6.5 million Texans in competitive choice areas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_Reliability_Council_of_Texas


The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) formed in 1970, is one of eight Independent System Operators in North America, and is the successor to the Texas Interconnected System (TIS). TIS originally formed in 1941 when several power companies banded together to provide their excess generation capacity to serve industrial loads on the Gulf Coast supporting the US war effort for World War II. ERCOT is one of nine regional electric reliability councils under North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) authority. NERC and the regional reliability councils were formed following the Northeast Blackout of 1965. ERCOT's offices are located in Austin and Taylor, Texas.

The ERCOT region occupies the entire Texas Interconnection, which occupies nearly all of the state of Texas. Unlike the other major NERC interconnections, the high voltage transmission and energy market within the Texas Interconnection is operated by ERCOT as essentially a single power system instead of as a network of cooperating utility companies.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f4/NERC-map-en.svg/600px-NERC-map-en.svg.png

[mrsmaalox]

Supposedly no one should have more than 4 black/brown outs today. Haven't had any here at my house yet.

[FalleNxWiZarDx]

no black outs yet so far here in stone oak

[Viva Las Espuelas]

stone oak

:lol y'all won't be affected. trust me

[mrsmaalox]

Also, the traffic lady on KENS 5 is saying that traffic lights are out around town because of the blackouts. There isn't a way to control those separately or have them on a back up system? I can understand if they are out because of the wind and weather, but for the rolling blackouts? That's too dangerous...

[mrsmaalox]

no black outs yet so far here in stone oak

That's where I am too. A friend of mine told me her kids' daycare in this area was out but so far it's the only outtage I've heard of. Coincidence I guess.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

maybe CPS should relay that to SAPD?

[RandomGuy]

Supposedly no one should have more than 4 black/brown outs today. Haven't had any here at my house yet.

There will probably be some areas with actual unplanned blackouts as well. Heard some scuttlebutt about places with prolonged blackouts.

If everybody expects a blackout, and the power actually goes down due to a downed power line or something, I guess that might not get reported for a while, until people start bitching about it.

Our house had a transformer blow in our back yard last night and lost power briefly. We still had the candles around the house with matches at hand from that when they instituted the rolling blackouts this morning. Good thing, I guess.

[desflood]

I have vaulted ceilings and tons of windows. I have the heat on 72 and it's 59 in here now. It will climb back up to 66-67 and the electricity goes off again and goes down rather fast.
We just had our second outage; lasted half an hour. It took all of 30 minutes for the house temp to fall 4 degrees. I told my husband to pick up some firewood on the way home for the middle of the night, just in case.

no black outs yet so far here in stone oak
I knew it :lol

[gospursgojas]

If there is a decision to start these blackouts knowing that, that would effect traffic lights as well.

Isn't that just a bad bad idea???

[Viva Las Espuelas]

maybe CPS should relay that to SAPD?

[Viva Las Espuelas]

or [email protected]

:wakeup

[MannyIsGod]

Also, the traffic lady on KENS 5 is saying that traffic lights are out around town because of the blackouts. There isn't a way to control those separately or have them on a back up system? I can understand if they are out because of the wind and weather, but for the rolling blackouts? That's too dangerous...

Newer lights come back on when the power comes on but the older ones have to be reset locally.

[SnakeBoy]

They either have plants offline or something is just fucked up.

According to CPS there a number of plants around the state were knocked offline by the temps and there isn't enough energy being generated statwide leading to the need for rolling blackouts.

[MannyIsGod]

I hope thats not true. Power plants shouldn't be knocked off line with the temps you're seeing. I can understand if they were down for maintence but not if they went down because of the cold.

[RandomGuy]

We just had our second outage; lasted half an hour. It took all of 30 minutes for the house temp to fall 4 degrees. I told my husband to pick up some firewood on the way home for the middle of the night, just in case.

I knew it :lol

Mythbusters did a bit on this. If you don't have it set up to draw in air from the outside, you can actually make the house colder.

Forum discussion at discovery made some interesting points:

Fire in Fireplace Causes Temperature Drop in Other Rooms (http://community.discovery.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/9401967776/m/8501965249)

[Shelly]

My power went off twice around 6 am and 6:30 am, and then again around 10:30.

My husband was in the middle of a procedure on a patient when the power went out in his office. He said the emergency back-up lights didn't work Good job, building maintenance.

[RandomGuy]

Also speaking of fireplaces, I remembered something my dad installed in our house in Wyoming that made a big difference.

Imagine a series of hollow tubes under the fire, and a fan blowing air through those tubes out into the room.

Looks a bit like this:
http://i.ehow.com/images/a05/6p/af/increase-heat-wood-burning-fireplace-800X800.jpg

(from ehow's How to Increase Heat from a Woodburning Fireplace (http://www.ehow.com/how_5465423_increase-heat-wood-burning-fireplace.html))

I remember curling up in front of that thing and snoozing during the deeper parts of winter.

Also, by the by, my brother, who still lives there texted me this morning.


39 below 69 below with wind chill ! burr!
I, for one, shall not be bitching about the cold. :) (much)

[RandomGuy]

My power went off twice around 6 am and 6:30 am, and then again around 10:30.

My husband was in the middle of a procedure on a patient when the power went out in his office. He said the emergency back-up lights didn't work Good job, building maintenance.

People usually never think about this kind of shit until the power goes out.

[Cant_Be_Faded]

the insane cold bloaded some of the power plants

[Viva Las Espuelas]

I thought doctor's offices, hospitals, and clinics are immune from the brownouts or whatever they're calling them. No?

[Kori Ellis]

We still haven't had any brownouts here in Hill Country Village. Hopefully they skip us :lol

[MannyIsGod]

I thought doctor's offices, hospitals, and clinics are immune from the brownouts or whatever they're calling them. No?

Hospitals but I doubt doctors offices will get the same treatment. (HAHAH PUN FUCKING INTENDED)

[Viva Las Espuelas]

Hmm......
You'd think they'd get the same attention.

[MannyIsGod]

They're not considered emergency services.

[RandomGuy]

We still haven't had any brownouts here in Hill Country Village. Hopefully they skip us :lol

Proximity to the airport might have something to do with that. I imagine that keeping power at the airport might be *something* of a priority.
I am working sort of close to it today and this office hasn't had any outages either.

[Crookshanks]

I live in Ft. Worth and my power was out this morning for awhile. It got down to below 60 in my apartment. Of course, it's only about 14 degrees outside right now so it doesn't take long for the temp to drop inside. My apartment is an older one and the windows and sliding door aren't well insulated - I had snow on the inside track of the door yesterday and I still have ice covering the inside of the door and windows today!

It really sucks for all the people in town for the Super Bowl. I heard that even the team's hotels were hit with the blackouts. Of course, having about a 100,000 extra people in town has probably contributed to the added strain on the power grid - what with all the bars and restaurants being open and all the parties going on.

[mrsmaalox]

Also speaking of fireplaces, I remembered something my dad installed in our house in Wyoming that made a big difference.

Imagine a series of hollow tubes under the fire, and a fan blowing air through those tubes out into the room.

Looks a bit like this:
http://i.ehow.com/images/a05/6p/af/increase-heat-wood-burning-fireplace-800X800.jpg

Back in the mid 90's I lived in Olympia, Washington and our only heat source was a wood stove that had a similar apparatus. And that thing sure did work! During the coldest days of winter, I'd start the big fire about 3pm and by 6pm it got so hot we'd all be in our undies until bedtime, but our 3 bedroom house was toasty until morning. When he got up at 6, my hubby would throw one log on the coals and that kept me and the babies fine until the afternoon.

[ploto]

timvp is at HEB right now and the power went out there. So far, everything is fine at home though.

-- Kori

Happened at the shopping center at IH10 and DeZavala, too, but my house has been fine.

[ploto]

Also, the traffic lady on KENS 5 is saying that traffic lights are out around town because of the blackouts. There isn't a way to control those separately or have them on a back up system? I can understand if they are out because of the wind and weather, but for the rolling blackouts? That's too dangerous...
Lockhill Selma and Huebner was fun this morning during rush hour and school time!

[MannyIsGod]

I live in Ft. Worth and my power was out this morning for awhile. It got down to below 60 in my apartment. Of course, it's only about 14 degrees outside right now so it doesn't take long for the temp to drop inside. My apartment is an older one and the windows and sliding door aren't well insulated - I had snow on the inside track of the door yesterday and I still have ice covering the inside of the door and windows today!

It really sucks for all the people in town for the Super Bowl. I heard that even the team's hotels were hit with the blackouts. Of course, having about a 100,000 extra people in town has probably contributed to the added strain on the power grid - what with all the bars and restaurants being open and all the parties going on.

The ice on the inside of the windows happens to us. I figured it was just condensation that freezes on the windows because its so cold. I had condensation on my glasses this morning that froze. :lol

[Shelly]

I thought doctor's offices, hospitals, and clinics are immune from the brownouts or whatever they're calling them. No?

His office isn't in a medical building anyway.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

It really sucks for all the people in town for the Super Bowl. I heard that even the team's hotels were hit with the blackouts. Of course, having about a 100,000 extra people in town has probably contributed to the added strain on the power grid - what with all the bars and restaurants being open and all the parties going on.
Yeah. I feel for all the businesses and people this is affecting. Well, everyone but Jerry. I'm sure Tom is grinning ear-to-ear right now. Looks like Saturday will be the only day to make up for all that lost business. I hope see it as a freak occurrence of global, oops........a freak occurrence of climate and it doesn't reflect bad on the area.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

by 6pm it got so hot we'd all be in our undies until bedtime........the babies.


Well that explains it. :lol

[bus driver]

just another scare to raise prices.......wait and see

[Viva Las Espuelas]

just another scare to raise prices.......wait and see
Nah. Candidate Obama was forthcoming about that.

[MannyIsGod]

Yeah. I feel for all the businesses and people this is affecting. Well, everyone but Jerry. I'm sure Tom is grinning ear-to-ear right now. Looks like Saturday will be the only day to make up for all that lost business. I hope see it as a freak occurrence of global, oops........a freak occurrence of climate and it doesn't reflect bad on the area.

There are working theories that AGW will lead to the type of block we've seen in place this year (and in the past few years) which allows arctic air to slide down south and develop these large storms while warming up the arctic a great deal.

The net result is an increase a warmer arctic and a colder continent due to an overall net increase in temp throughout the whole system. Far from a widely accepted theory but the weather this winter has done a lot to make scientists view it as a plausible scenario.

[Drachen]

Back in the mid 90's I lived in Olympia, Washington and our only heat source was a wood stove that had a similar apparatus. And that thing sure did work! During the coldest days of winter, I'd start the big fire about 3pm and by 6pm it got so hot we'd all be in our undies until bedtime, but our 3 bedroom house was toasty until morning. When he got up at 6, my hubby would throw one log on the coals and that kept me and the babies fine until the afternoon.

I didnt know such a thing existed, I was thinking about inventing something like this. When I was young our fireplace had 4 vents built into the brick. The pipes were built into the top of the fireplace and exposed to the fire which then were connected to those vents and it just blew out hot air due to the expansion of the air (no blowers). this worked great!

I am glad to know that such a thing exists, even though they seem to be 500 dollars. Unless someone finds one with a substantially better price, I won't be getting one.

[Blake]

Also, the traffic lady on KENS 5 is saying that traffic lights are out around town because of the blackouts. There isn't a way to control those separately or have them on a back up system? I can understand if they are out because of the wind and weather, but for the rolling blackouts? That's too dangerous...

the damn light at 281/1604 was out.

If you know how backed up traffic usually is around noon....just double that.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

Authorities will definitely be called out for that.

[MannyIsGod]

There should definitely be coordination between CPS and SAPD regarding those huge intersections. You can't just make that shit a free for all.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

makes sense.

[CubanMustGo]

ERCOT said at 1:45 that the rolling blackouts were done (according to statesman.com, I'm too lazy to look up the link again).

[RandomGuy]

ERCOT said at 1:45 that the rolling blackouts were done (according to statesman.com, I'm too lazy to look up the link again).

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/weather/entries/2011/02/02/statewide_power.html


ERCOT has ended the emergency rotating blackouts, but officials said there is a strong possibility that they will be required again this evening or tomorrow, depending on how quickly the disabled generation units can be returned to service.

Officials with the state’s power transmission grid operator urged residents and businesses to continue to conserve energy, particularly between 6 and 10 p.m.

The Austin utility has begun sending out repair crews to customers who have had extended power outages, spokesman Ed Clark said.

Anyone who has experienced a power outage of one hour or more to contact the utility at (512) 322-9100.

Clark said there have been other outages not related to the rolling blackouts, but he could not say how many customers were affected or where they had occurred. The immediate focus today has been addressing the rolling blackouts, he said.

Weee.

Pipes froze at the house. Not cracked that we know of, but no water.

Lucky for us the heat is a gas furnace, so if the power goes out, we don't freeze.

[ploto]

CPS Outage map.

http://www.cpsenergy.com/CPSEnergyOutageMap/CPSStaticMapV2_EXT.html

[Shelly]

ERCOT called off the rolling blackouts and CPS admits not being prepared for cold weather

[MannyIsGod]

Like I said in the other thread, any energy company caught unaware of what was going to happen is just extremely poorly prepared and it is pretty inexcusable.

[Nathan Explosion]

CPS implementing rolling blackouts now, I heard from a friend at I-10 and crossroads they are powerless.

http://www.ksat.com/weather/26708171/detail.html

I'm at Medical and I-10 and didn't experience any power outage. My father in law said the lights were out at his house when he got home from work.

[CubanMustGo]

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/weather/entries/2011/02/02/statewide_power.html



Weee.

Pipes froze at the house. Not cracked that we know of, but no water.

Lucky for us the heat is a gas furnace, so if the power goes out, we don't freeze.

Ah, the bit about more blackouts being possibly needed later was added after my post. You think they'd get shit figured out by now, with all the businesses going offline the demand shouldn't be dramatically higher in the evening.

[mrsmaalox]

CPS Outage map.

http://www.cpsenergy.com/CPSEnergyOutageMap/CPSStaticMapV2_EXT.html

Ploto, do you know if that map displays the ERCOT mandated rolling blackouts, or is it just the incidental weather related power outtages or both?

[Trainwreck2100]

i really hope they cut the power off at my job tonight

[Tinystarz]

southwest side. No power outage here. My friend down two street said her power went out around 9am. My neighbor asked if the water was out. I was like no my water still works...gonna shower.

[boutons_deux]

damn, how can expensive engineers design power plants sensitive to cold weather?


"more than 50 power plants stopped working Tuesday night because of the cold weather.

Burst water pipes at two plants, Oak Grove and Sand Hill, forced the plants to cut power production, Dewhurst said he was told, and natural gas plants that should have provided back up had difficulty starting due to low pressure in the supply lines, also from the cold weather.

Comision Federal de Electricidad, Latin America's largest power company by sales, was reportedly sending 280 megawatts to Texas, Bloomberg News reported Wednesday afternoon.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/CPS-ERCOT-say-power-outages-Wednesday-are-over-991690.php#ixzz1CqWl1ZV9

=========

Ha Ha TX bailed out by MX. that's rich!

[BacktoBasics]

News here in Corpus is that they plan to continue this until Sunday. If I get a blackout during the super bowl I'll have fucking heads.

[MannyIsGod]

Thats fucking pathetic. The temps experienced in Texas should have been WELL inside the tolerance levels of any power plant. It wasn't THAT cold.

[ploto]

Ploto, do you know if that map displays the ERCOT mandated rolling blackouts, or is it just the incidental weather related power outtages or both?

I don't know. I did not find it until after the rolling blackouts seemed to have ended.

[ploto]

The temps experienced in Texas should have been WELL inside the tolerance levels of any power plant. It wasn't THAT cold.

I seem to recall hitting 18 to 20 degrees about this time last year.

Maybe, they just got people all worked up more this time. I went to HEB today and you would have thought a hurricane was hitting the way people wiped out the shelves yesterday.

[Das Texan]

CPS can suck my fucking dick.


They lied #1 this morning. Supposedly they said, 15 minutes tops. Fine. I know I was down for AT LEAST 45 minutes. Fuck that.

I find it funny that none of Stone Oak went down. I assume its due to the hospitals there (they should be on their own separate circuit though probably, different arguement), though I wouldnt be shocked if it was because of their median income over there.

CPS fucked up royally today and they fucked up bad. It's one thing to be forced to turn off some of the power. Its another thing to basically go around like your fucking head is cut off and do it without informing ANYONE.

Someone told the CPS top exec, hey maybe you should notify the media about this so they can let people know. The exec, ya maybe thats a good idea, we will look into that in the future.

Fuck them.

[Viva Las Espuelas]

2jqQsDklQEM

[Das Texan]

damn, how can expensive engineers design power plants sensitive to cold weather?


"more than 50 power plants stopped working Tuesday night because of the cold weather.

Burst water pipes at two plants, Oak Grove and Sand Hill, forced the plants to cut power production, Dewhurst said he was told, and natural gas plants that should have provided back up had difficulty starting due to low pressure in the supply lines, also from the cold weather.

Comision Federal de Electricidad, Latin America's largest power company by sales, was reportedly sending 280 megawatts to Texas, Bloomberg News reported Wednesday afternoon.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/CPS-ERCOT-say-power-outages-Wednesday-are-over-991690.php#ixzz1CqWl1ZV9

=========

Ha Ha TX bailed out by MX. that's rich!



I think thats a bullshit excuse, but whatever. Like Manny said, there is NO WAY temperatures in the teens should have brought down so many plants. Someone didnt do their fucking job.

[MannyIsGod]

I seem to recall hitting 18 to 20 degrees about this time last year.

Maybe, they just got people all worked up more this time. I went to HEB today and you would have thought a hurricane was hitting the way people wiped out the shelves yesterday.

Northern Texas was below zero so I'd imagine thats were the power plants were located but below zero temps in northern Texas aren't unheard of. It happens - rarely - but it does happen.

Its just unacceptable for this to occur.

[Das Texan]

For the record, Oak Grove is out by Bryan/College Station and Sand Hill is in Austin.

[boutons_deux]

"I seem to recall hitting 18 to 20 degrees about this time last year."

There was coldspell of 3 days last Jan where daytime was mid 30s max, and night lows in low 20s/high teens. Lots of Queen palms and other barely hardy but quite old plants died.

[ChumpDumper]

Burst water pipes at two plantsHow many engineers does it take to set the faucets to drip?

No outages in my neighborhood yet. Guess it pays to live near richers.

[Bito Corleone]

How many engineers does it take to set the faucets to drip?

No outages in my neighborhood yet. Guess it pays to live near richers.

Fuck that man. I live in Olmos Park and my power went out 3 different times today.

[Nathan Explosion]

I seem to recall hitting 18 to 20 degrees about this time last year.

Maybe, they just got people all worked up more this time. I went to HEB today and you would have thought a hurricane was hitting the way people wiped out the shelves yesterday.

People shop more when a cold snap is coming. We actually get emails about the forecast so we can order more product for this.

But it was also the first of the month, WIC, food stamps, government checks and bi-monthly checks all came in yesterday. Very busy shopping day all around.

[RandomGuy]

Northern Texas was below zero so I'd imagine thats were the power plants were located but below zero temps in northern Texas aren't unheard of. It happens - rarely - but it does happen.

Its just unacceptable for this to occur.

I think it was the speed of the temperature drop that did it.

[RandomGuy]

It looks like we may avoid any blackouts tonight.


ERCOT, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, said rotating power outages may not be necessary today, unlike Wednesday when rolling blackouts hit Houston and much of the state.

The rolling blackouts are still possible especially between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m., but ERCOT officials said the condition of state's power grid is improving despite heavy consumer demand created by the winter storm raking portions the state.

ERCOT, which manages the flow of electric power in much of the state, will be monitoring the grid to determine if the statewide rotating outages need to be instituted again because of unexpected losses of power generation.

Consumers are urged to conserve their power use, particularly during peak demand periods.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7410936.html




"I'm frustrated, my wife is frustrated : the people of Texas are frustrated," said Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. "That's one of the things I'm going to spend my afternoon on, since the cold weather will be continuing for a few days, to make sure this doesn't continue."
more by David Dewhurst - 3 hours ago - Dallas Morning News

Good bit on the particulars for those interested:


Feb 3 (Reuters) - ERCOT, the power grid operator for most of Texas, said immediate concerns of rotating blackouts were reduced Thursday morning as some generation returned to service overnight. ERCOT said about 3,000 megawatts of generation remained out of service Thursday morning due to the extreme cold. On Wednesday, ERCOT said more than 50 power units, capable of generating about 7,000 MW, were out of service.

The following lists a few of the major power plant outages from Feb. 2 and the reason those plants shut.

* Luminant's 568-MW Unit 4 at the Sandow coal-fired power plant in Texas shut on Feb. 2 after a feed water flow low suction alarm. The alarm was triggered by a faulty feed water flow transmitter line that froze. Luminant expected the unit to return later on Feb. 2.

* Texas Municipal Power Authority's 470-MW Gibbons Creek coal plant in Texas shut on Feb. 1 after the cold weather stressed many systems, including electronic level indicators and their transmitters. Specifically, the company said the drum liquid level indicators had frozen. TMPA said it was using heaters to unfreeze the affected systems but did not say when
the unit would return. [ID:nSGE71204H]
* NRG Energy Inc's (NRG.N: Quote) 831-MW Unit 1 at the Limestone coal-fired power plant in Texas shut on Feb. 2 due to problems with phase disconnects and insulators. NRG expected the unit to return on Feb. 2-3. [ID:nN02291579]
The following table lists the number of customers affected
by the rolling blackouts:
UTILITY CUTOMERS AFFECTED TOTAL CUSTOMERS CUSTOMERS DURING ROTATION AFFECTED SERVED
Oncor --- --- 3,000,000
CenterPoint 330,000 --- 2,000,000
AEP 90,000 600,000 946,000
San Antonio
CPS Energy 70,000 --- 707,000
Austin Energy 70,000 --- 400,000
TNMP --- --- 230,000
*El Paso Electric --- --- 372,000
* El Paso Electric is not part of ERCOT but the U.S. Department of Energy said El Paso began its own rolling blackouts on Feb. 2 after the cold weather shut down all eight of its local generators, leaving the company reliant on purchased power to serve customer demand. :wow [I][I am guessing somebody's head will be on a stick for that one.--RG]
(Reporting by Scott DiSavino in New York and Soma Das in
Bangalore)
http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFN0321006020110203


Of course our state legislature will probably find *some* money despite the deficits to address the problem....
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/local-news/20110202-state-lawmakers-call-for-action-after-wednesday_s-rolling-blackouts-frustrate-texans.ece

[RandomGuy]

Here is where the ercot press releases can be found in their original form:

http://www.ercot.com/news/press_releases/

As of right now their most current (6:34am_) statement:
Grid condition improving but conservation still urged (http://www.ercot.com/news/press_releases/2011/nr02-03-11)


The grid continues to have about 3,000 MW of generation out of service due to the effects of the extreme cold

[RandomGuy]

Most recent bit I could dig up here:

http://www.kztv10.com/news/expect-more-rolling-blackouts-thursday/
Expect More Rolling Blackouts Thursday

edit:

LINK BROKEN, story removed at source. Probably due to cancellation of blackouts.