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Do we really need to pay for an electric grid that can handle a once every 20 year load?
by khuey 6y ago
Do we really need to pay for an electric grid that can handle a once every 20 year load?
- pwarner 6y agoThat's the real question. Even 1 in 10 year load, do you build for it or just live with it? It's just a $ decision.
- manquer 6y agoGrid yes , maybe not the power plants themselves. Typically in robust networks you have good interconnects to neighbours you can purchase power from . Also robust grid which enables selling back to the grid would have helped, such extreme hot weather goes in hand with solar generation
- khuey 6y agoThe problem is not lack of grid capacity. California is capable of importing upwards of 11 GW[0] but there was only around 8 GW[1] available yesterday because it's hot in neighboring states like Oregon too. The load shedding occurred around 8-10pm after the sun has gone down (but while it's still quite hot) so more solar wouldn't help much. [0] http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/supply.aspx http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/supply.aspx and select 9/13/2019 [1] Same as above but select 8/14/2020.
- AngryData 6y agoDo you really need to pay for house wiring that can handle a once every 20 year load? Pretty sure you would change your tune when the wiring melts in one of your walls.
- khuey 6y agoThis is why houses have circuit breakers, which are functionally identical to the load shedding we had last night ...
- cableshaft 6y agoThanks to climate change, this is probably not going to continue to be a 1 in 20 year load. Expect this to be more and more frequent over the coming years. Might be an every year and/or multiple times a year thing within the next decade or two. I've read some predictions that suggest these heat waves becoming a regular thing could happen within the next five years, but I'm sticking with more conservative predictions.