7 ms·

Is there a way to fix it? Underground lines would be prohibitively expensive.

Svip 7y ago
I am genuinely curious why in a rich country like the USA, wires aren't dug down. I realise using my own country - Denmark - is an unfair comparison, since it's much smaller, but all wires leading to houses are dug down here. Even out in the rural countryside. However, even a small state like Rhode Island has plenty of overhead wires, despite being a tenth the size of Denmark. But surely a rich state like California could dig down wires in areas where it would significant benefits. The benefits are everywhere, obviously, but some areas would gain more benefits than others. Can a state/country really be considered rich, if it cannot afford to dig down electric wires?
- AFascistWorld 7y ago
  Unfortunately, there are too many places demanding money in CA, the Bullet Train, congested roads, teachers, homeless people, housing shortage, solutions to protect houses from wild fires.
- owenmarshall 7y ago
  Because doing infrastructure well - as opposed to holding it together with bubblegum and bailing wire - means spending money. And every dime spent is one dime less for shareholders. As the saying goes: this suboptimal outcome is a feature, not a bug.
  - lacker 7y ago
    And every dime spent is one dime less for shareholders. Well, PG+E just went bankrupt, so there aren't any dimes left for shareholders anyway. It's not like they're making a huge margin of profit.
  - nostromo95 7y ago
    No that’s not how utilities work. Utilities are compensated for the approved capital they invest in infrastructure in the form of higher customer rates. The upshot of this is that every utility in the country would love nothing more than to underground every overhead line in their service area. The reason this doesn’t happen is because public service commissions, who approve capital plans, aren’t willing to saddle customers with the astronomical costs of undergrounding lines (which runs $2-$3M per mile on distribution, depending on rock content of soil).
    - HenryKissinger 7y ago
      Let's say you want to bury a line 30 miles long. The upper end of your estimate is $90M. If the line services 50k customers, that's an average cost of $1,800 per customer. Charge an extra $50 on people's monthly bills for a period of 36 months, and your underground line is paid for.
      - 0xffff2 7y ago
        My entire monthly bill from PG&E is usually about $50...
        seanmcdirmid 7y ago
        Ya, without the need to run AC or heat (like in SF or even LA outside of summer), electric bills can be pretty cheap.
      - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
        Unless you live in an area where electricity prices are sky high and A/C is all but a necessity that's like 50% of people's bills. That might fly in some rich suburb of NYC but try that in Buffalo and the tar and feathers would come out.
      - rootusrootus 7y ago
        PG&E has 81,000 miles of distribution lines. Even if they served all of California (they do not), that would be less than 15K customers for an average 30 mile segment.
  - pixl97 7y ago
    >Because doing infrastructure well Building infrastructure well means telling people no. We have a problem with that in the US. No. You cannot build in the floodplain. No. You cannot build in the wildland urban interface. No. You cannot build on a mudslide prone slope. No. You cannot build in the surge zone. We just don't do that. Instead we have a system where elect people to give us what we want without paying for the long term consequences. Simply put, we can't fix California, we don't have the money to. People in at risk areas need to be charged for the expense they add to the system, no new customers need added to the system. If you wonder why the US doesn't build densely, it's because we don't pay for the true cost of our sprawl.
- abtinf 7y ago
  Perhaps we are rich because, in this and a thousand other small decisions, we are not forced to make the economically inefficient decision? Cables are underground where it makes sense (higher density neighborhoods where you have to dig during construction anyway) and above ground where it doesn’t (lower density rural areas). Every time people are forced to make an inefficient decision, the cost is multiplied a thousand fold over time throughout the economy. Money spent burying cables isn’t available to invest elsewhere; a factory goes unbuilt; it doesn’t produce material wealth; it doesn’t hire a young worker into an entry level job; that worker never has a chance to grow and apply their mind to solve new problems; he doesn’t build a new, better factory or tech company one day.
  - Filligree 7y ago
    You say that, but constructing infrastructure costs several times more in the US than in, say, Denmark. Why is that?
    - jrobn 7y ago
      Phony free market infrastructure bidding.
    - rootusrootus 7y ago
      I would be interested to know where you got data on that topic.
    - gwright 7y ago
      I don't think it is fair to toss all infrastructure in the same bucket but for infrastructure projects where there are US federal dollars involved, the Davis-Bacon act is one reason why costs are high. TL;DR Labor rates are above market rates due to the legislative requirements. See https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/08/31/union-wages-increase-construction-costs-by-20-abolish-davis-bacon/#13b14a13406e https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/08/31/union-wa... for one point of view on this issue. It isn't clear to me if these legislative mandates apply to power-line construction though.
- lacker 7y ago
  The distances are just much larger in rural California than in Denmark. The cost of putting all those wires underground is too expensive.
  - HenryKissinger 7y ago
    How expensive are we talking? $1,000 per mile? $10,000 per mile?
    - lacker 7y ago
      This is old and not in California, so it's probably an underestimate, but $2 million per mile to put power lines underground. https://www.elp.com/articles/powergrid_international/print/volume-18/issue-2/features/underground-vs-overhead-power-line-installation-cost-comparison-.html https://www.elp.com/articles/powergrid_international/print/v...
    - rootusrootus 7y ago
      PG&E says they spend about $800,000 per mile to run an overhead line, and about $5M per mile to convert overhead line to underground. http://www.pgecurrents.com/2017/10/31/facts-about-undergrounding-electric-lines/ http://www.pgecurrents.com/2017/10/31/facts-about-undergroun...
      - azernik 7y ago
        Those numbers seem to be referring to urban areas, where burying is more expensive.
        pixl97 7y ago
        Burying is more expensive, but you eventually earn the money back. Density is so low in the country it could be 50+ years before you pay it off. This is part of the trillion dollar sprawl problem we have. We have built a massive amount of infrastructure as cheap as possible, and now we cant afford to built it correctly. People would have never built houses in many places if they had to pay the actual costs.
- 0x445442 7y ago
  There are certainly places where underground power lines are feasible in the US but not in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. If you saw where the lines in question span you'd be in awe of the terrain.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  >I am genuinely curious why in a rich country like the USA, wires aren't dug down. Because if we catered to every "we're a rich country, why don't we" request across every subject we'd have a government financial situation akin to that of the USSR circa 1988. Not to mention the fact that burying power lines across rural areas would be exorbitantly expensive. It's one thing to bury power lines in New Jersey. It's another to bury all the power lines in Wisconsin. For what it's worth, the power lines are generally buried in the more dense and rich (must be both, not just one) cites.
- pkaye 7y ago
  Newer construction in California are using underground wiring. With older areas the process is quite disruptives and expensive. You have to dig up the streets and private property. The state might be rich but then the labor cost of doing stuff is expensive.
- ip26 7y ago
  They are dug down in many parts of the USA where it was found to be worth it. Chronic ice storms, high winds, etc. In California's defense, the risk/benefit equation has only recently shifted with the intensifying fire seasons & fuel buildup.
amluto 7y ago
Petersen coils, “ground fault neutralizers,” and similar devices could help considerably. Underground lines have their own set of issues, primarily that they have dramatically increased capacitive current. This is manageable, I believe.
- pixl97 7y ago
  A big problem with retrofitting above ground to below ground, especially in California, is the environmentalists aren't going to let it happen in many places it needs to. Especially when it comes to crossing creeks and dry washes, additional underground cable burying is going to cause a lot of land disturbance. And you're not just burying power in many of these places. Telephone and cable are strung along those same poles. Also many times poles to individual homes can cross sensitive areas because they are low impact, especially in very rocky locations. Unregulated growth wherever people want to build isn't going to be an affordable problem, no matter how much money people think California has.
  - 7952 7y ago
    Can't you use HDD or thrust bore for creeks?

Svip 7y ago

I am genuinely curious why in a rich country like the USA, wires aren't dug down. I realise using my own country - Denmark - is an unfair comparison, since it's much smaller, but all wires leading to houses are dug down here. Even out in the rural countryside. However, even a small state like Rhode Island has plenty of overhead wires, despite being a tenth the size of Denmark. But surely a rich state like California could dig down wires in areas where it would significant benefits. The benefits are everywhere, obviously, but some areas would gain more benefits than others. Can a state/country really be considered rich, if it cannot afford to dig down electric wires?

AFascistWorld 7y ago
Unfortunately, there are too many places demanding money in CA, the Bullet Train, congested roads, teachers, homeless people, housing shortage, solutions to protect houses from wild fires.
owenmarshall 7y ago
Because doing infrastructure well - as opposed to holding it together with bubblegum and bailing wire - means spending money. And every dime spent is one dime less for shareholders. As the saying goes: this suboptimal outcome is a feature, not a bug.
- lacker 7y ago
  And every dime spent is one dime less for shareholders. Well, PG+E just went bankrupt, so there aren't any dimes left for shareholders anyway. It's not like they're making a huge margin of profit.
- nostromo95 7y ago
  No that’s not how utilities work. Utilities are compensated for the approved capital they invest in infrastructure in the form of higher customer rates. The upshot of this is that every utility in the country would love nothing more than to underground every overhead line in their service area. The reason this doesn’t happen is because public service commissions, who approve capital plans, aren’t willing to saddle customers with the astronomical costs of undergrounding lines (which runs $2-$3M per mile on distribution, depending on rock content of soil).
  - HenryKissinger 7y ago
    Let's say you want to bury a line 30 miles long. The upper end of your estimate is $90M. If the line services 50k customers, that's an average cost of $1,800 per customer. Charge an extra $50 on people's monthly bills for a period of 36 months, and your underground line is paid for.
    - 0xffff2 7y ago
      My entire monthly bill from PG&E is usually about $50...
      - seanmcdirmid 7y ago
        Ya, without the need to run AC or heat (like in SF or even LA outside of summer), electric bills can be pretty cheap.
    - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
      Unless you live in an area where electricity prices are sky high and A/C is all but a necessity that's like 50% of people's bills. That might fly in some rich suburb of NYC but try that in Buffalo and the tar and feathers would come out.
    - rootusrootus 7y ago
      PG&E has 81,000 miles of distribution lines. Even if they served all of California (they do not), that would be less than 15K customers for an average 30 mile segment.
- pixl97 7y ago
  >Because doing infrastructure well Building infrastructure well means telling people no. We have a problem with that in the US. No. You cannot build in the floodplain. No. You cannot build in the wildland urban interface. No. You cannot build on a mudslide prone slope. No. You cannot build in the surge zone. We just don't do that. Instead we have a system where elect people to give us what we want without paying for the long term consequences. Simply put, we can't fix California, we don't have the money to. People in at risk areas need to be charged for the expense they add to the system, no new customers need added to the system. If you wonder why the US doesn't build densely, it's because we don't pay for the true cost of our sprawl.
abtinf 7y ago
Perhaps we are rich because, in this and a thousand other small decisions, we are not forced to make the economically inefficient decision? Cables are underground where it makes sense (higher density neighborhoods where you have to dig during construction anyway) and above ground where it doesn’t (lower density rural areas). Every time people are forced to make an inefficient decision, the cost is multiplied a thousand fold over time throughout the economy. Money spent burying cables isn’t available to invest elsewhere; a factory goes unbuilt; it doesn’t produce material wealth; it doesn’t hire a young worker into an entry level job; that worker never has a chance to grow and apply their mind to solve new problems; he doesn’t build a new, better factory or tech company one day.
- Filligree 7y ago
  You say that, but constructing infrastructure costs several times more in the US than in, say, Denmark. Why is that?
  - jrobn 7y ago
    Phony free market infrastructure bidding.
  - rootusrootus 7y ago
    I would be interested to know where you got data on that topic.
  - gwright 7y ago
    I don't think it is fair to toss all infrastructure in the same bucket but for infrastructure projects where there are US federal dollars involved, the Davis-Bacon act is one reason why costs are high. TL;DR Labor rates are above market rates due to the legislative requirements. See https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/08/31/union-wages-increase-construction-costs-by-20-abolish-davis-bacon/#13b14a13406e https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/08/31/union-wa... for one point of view on this issue. It isn't clear to me if these legislative mandates apply to power-line construction though.
lacker 7y ago
The distances are just much larger in rural California than in Denmark. The cost of putting all those wires underground is too expensive.
- HenryKissinger 7y ago
  How expensive are we talking? $1,000 per mile? $10,000 per mile?
  - lacker 7y ago
    This is old and not in California, so it's probably an underestimate, but $2 million per mile to put power lines underground. https://www.elp.com/articles/powergrid_international/print/volume-18/issue-2/features/underground-vs-overhead-power-line-installation-cost-comparison-.html https://www.elp.com/articles/powergrid_international/print/v...
  - rootusrootus 7y ago
    PG&E says they spend about $800,000 per mile to run an overhead line, and about $5M per mile to convert overhead line to underground. http://www.pgecurrents.com/2017/10/31/facts-about-undergrounding-electric-lines/ http://www.pgecurrents.com/2017/10/31/facts-about-undergroun...
    - azernik 7y ago
      Those numbers seem to be referring to urban areas, where burying is more expensive.
      - pixl97 7y ago
        Burying is more expensive, but you eventually earn the money back. Density is so low in the country it could be 50+ years before you pay it off. This is part of the trillion dollar sprawl problem we have. We have built a massive amount of infrastructure as cheap as possible, and now we cant afford to built it correctly. People would have never built houses in many places if they had to pay the actual costs.
0x445442 7y ago
There are certainly places where underground power lines are feasible in the US but not in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. If you saw where the lines in question span you'd be in awe of the terrain.
dsfyu404ed 7y ago
>I am genuinely curious why in a rich country like the USA, wires aren't dug down. Because if we catered to every "we're a rich country, why don't we" request across every subject we'd have a government financial situation akin to that of the USSR circa 1988. Not to mention the fact that burying power lines across rural areas would be exorbitantly expensive. It's one thing to bury power lines in New Jersey. It's another to bury all the power lines in Wisconsin. For what it's worth, the power lines are generally buried in the more dense and rich (must be both, not just one) cites.
pkaye 7y ago
Newer construction in California are using underground wiring. With older areas the process is quite disruptives and expensive. You have to dig up the streets and private property. The state might be rich but then the labor cost of doing stuff is expensive.
ip26 7y ago
They are dug down in many parts of the USA where it was found to be worth it. Chronic ice storms, high winds, etc. In California's defense, the risk/benefit equation has only recently shifted with the intensifying fire seasons & fuel buildup.

amluto 7y ago

Petersen coils, “ground fault neutralizers,” and similar devices could help considerably. Underground lines have their own set of issues, primarily that they have dramatically increased capacitive current. This is manageable, I believe.

pixl97 7y ago
A big problem with retrofitting above ground to below ground, especially in California, is the environmentalists aren't going to let it happen in many places it needs to. Especially when it comes to crossing creeks and dry washes, additional underground cable burying is going to cause a lot of land disturbance. And you're not just burying power in many of these places. Telephone and cable are strung along those same poles. Also many times poles to individual homes can cross sensitive areas because they are low impact, especially in very rocky locations. Unregulated growth wherever people want to build isn't going to be an affordable problem, no matter how much money people think California has.
- 7952 7y ago
  Can't you use HDD or thrust bore for creeks?