4 ms·

Texas is without power at the moment.

by hwc 5y ago

capableweb 5y ago
Thought you were joking at first, how can an entire state be without power? But seems you're right, how the hell does that happen in a first-world country? Tried to access some dashboards that are supposed to show some data, but not sure if I can't access it because I'm not in the US/Texas or if it's down as well (because they don't have power?) - https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards - https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions - https://www.ercot.com/gridinfo https://www.ercot.com/gridinfo Says "This request was blocked by the security rules" so I'm assuming it's the former.
- dhosek 5y ago
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- Retric 5y ago
  https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions Is showing green for me, so some people might be without power but most of the state is fine.
- vel0city 5y ago
  ERCOT doesn't do power delivery, you wouldn't see how many people are without power by checking out ERCOT. You would want to look at one of the several power delivery companies, such as Oncor. https://stormcenter.oncor.com/ https://stormcenter.oncor.com/ They show 7,073 customers affected by outages out of 3,835,901 customers served. That's 0.18% of customers affected. Texas-New Mexico Power is another power delivery company in Texas. https://www.tnmp.com/power-outage-map https://www.tnmp.com/power-outage-map They are showing 1,195 customers affected. They serve ~400k customers. So ~0.3% of customers are without power for that company. Austin Energy is another power company in Texas, they serve pretty much the entire city of Austin so ~1M customers. They are reporting 24 affected customers. So 0.0024% of customers affected. https://outagemap.austinenergy.com/external/default.html https://outagemap.austinenergy.com/external/default.html The above poster is not right, and neither are you for suggesting some massive amount of the state is without power.
  - capableweb 5y ago
    Thank you, that oncor website seems to be available to me. I was browsing around some news article that seemed to echo the same sentiment, tried to access the source data myself and couldn't, so made an assumption. That was an error on my part and I'm sorry for that. Thank you for providing a better source that seems accessible worldwide.
    - vel0city 5y ago
      > so made an assumption You shared lies and slandered a state suggesting its a third world country based on false data.
      - runako 5y ago
        To be fair, our power grid does have a tendency to fail regularly across the US. Texas last year, California's rolling blackouts, NY blackouts, etc. There's a reason that upper-middle-class homeowners have been buying Generac generators en masse.
        vel0city 5y ago
        Power grids tend to fail just about everywhere that experiences extreme weather. Its not necessarily a US-only thing. Its just that the US experiences a pretty large share of extreme weather compared to most of the developed world. Far more tornadoes, hurricanes, wildfires, etc. affect the US than say, Europe.
        runako 5y ago
        California's rolling blackouts were not the result of any particularly extreme (for California!) weather. Similarly, hurricanes are not new to most of the hurricane-afflicted parts of the country. Wildfires have been a force in the US for a long time, and the West has experienced seasonal wildfires for decades. The difference is the US doesn't generally build or maintain infrastructure in a fashion commensurate with the extant risks here (which are different than those of e.g. Germany). Obviously, it is possible to keep a grid running when it is extremely cold outside, see the Nordics and Russia, for example. The US just makes systematic choices not to build & maintain to that standard.
- dfxm12 5y ago
  But seems you're right, how the hell does that happen in a first-world country? An interesting note is that Texas has its own power grid, more or less, and it isn't federally regulated. more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-its-own-power-grid.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-it...
vel0city 5y ago
Less than 1% of people in Texas lost power from this storm, and most who did lose power lost power for only a few hours tops. More people lost power in Ohio and Tennessee from this storm than people in Texas. Only two people in my network of people I know lost power in Texas, one of which was a coworker's neighbor because said coworker's tree dropped a branch on the neighbor's overhead power delivery line.
bdcravens 5y ago
Actually our grid has held up pretty well this time around.
- yurishimo 5y ago
  It also didn't get nearly as cold as last year, and not for as long. Plus, the providers ramped up production the first evening to the point where wholesale rates were negative to incentivize more usage. Another week+ of 0 degrees would likely have not been as smooth...
Rebelgecko 5y ago
My parents house in California had no electricity for over a week (Christmas through New Year's, and it was sporadic until about Jan 8). I think the state is still doing fine as a tech hub.
- kelnos 5y ago
  I think the point is that if a large portion of Texas currently didn't have power (which seems to not be the case, but whatever), then they might be under-represented in this poll because I imagine fewer people in place without power would be browsing HN than usual.

Texas is without power at the moment.

by hwc 5y ago

Texas is without power at the moment.

Thought you were joking at first, how can an entire state be without power? But seems you're right, how the hell does that happen in a first-world country? Tried to access some dashboards that are supposed to show some data, but not sure if I can't access it because I'm not in the US/Texas or if it's down as well (because they don't have power?) - https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards - https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions - https://www.ercot.com/gridinfo https://www.ercot.com/gridinfo Says "This request was blocked by the security rules" so I'm assuming it's the former.

dhosek 5y ago
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
Retric 5y ago
https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards/gridconditions Is showing green for me, so some people might be without power but most of the state is fine.
vel0city 5y ago
ERCOT doesn't do power delivery, you wouldn't see how many people are without power by checking out ERCOT. You would want to look at one of the several power delivery companies, such as Oncor. https://stormcenter.oncor.com/ https://stormcenter.oncor.com/ They show 7,073 customers affected by outages out of 3,835,901 customers served. That's 0.18% of customers affected. Texas-New Mexico Power is another power delivery company in Texas. https://www.tnmp.com/power-outage-map https://www.tnmp.com/power-outage-map They are showing 1,195 customers affected. They serve ~400k customers. So ~0.3% of customers are without power for that company. Austin Energy is another power company in Texas, they serve pretty much the entire city of Austin so ~1M customers. They are reporting 24 affected customers. So 0.0024% of customers affected. https://outagemap.austinenergy.com/external/default.html https://outagemap.austinenergy.com/external/default.html The above poster is not right, and neither are you for suggesting some massive amount of the state is without power.
- capableweb 5y ago
  Thank you, that oncor website seems to be available to me. I was browsing around some news article that seemed to echo the same sentiment, tried to access the source data myself and couldn't, so made an assumption. That was an error on my part and I'm sorry for that. Thank you for providing a better source that seems accessible worldwide.
  - vel0city 5y ago
    > so made an assumption You shared lies and slandered a state suggesting its a third world country based on false data.
    - runako 5y ago
      To be fair, our power grid does have a tendency to fail regularly across the US. Texas last year, California's rolling blackouts, NY blackouts, etc. There's a reason that upper-middle-class homeowners have been buying Generac generators en masse.
      - vel0city 5y ago
        Power grids tend to fail just about everywhere that experiences extreme weather. Its not necessarily a US-only thing. Its just that the US experiences a pretty large share of extreme weather compared to most of the developed world. Far more tornadoes, hurricanes, wildfires, etc. affect the US than say, Europe.
        runako 5y ago
        California's rolling blackouts were not the result of any particularly extreme (for California!) weather. Similarly, hurricanes are not new to most of the hurricane-afflicted parts of the country. Wildfires have been a force in the US for a long time, and the West has experienced seasonal wildfires for decades. The difference is the US doesn't generally build or maintain infrastructure in a fashion commensurate with the extant risks here (which are different than those of e.g. Germany). Obviously, it is possible to keep a grid running when it is extremely cold outside, see the Nordics and Russia, for example. The US just makes systematic choices not to build & maintain to that standard.
dfxm12 5y ago
But seems you're right, how the hell does that happen in a first-world country? An interesting note is that Texas has its own power grid, more or less, and it isn't federally regulated. more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-its-own-power-grid.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-it...

vel0city 5y ago

Less than 1% of people in Texas lost power from this storm, and most who did lose power lost power for only a few hours tops. More people lost power in Ohio and Tennessee from this storm than people in Texas. Only two people in my network of people I know lost power in Texas, one of which was a coworker's neighbor because said coworker's tree dropped a branch on the neighbor's overhead power delivery line.

bdcravens 5y ago

Actually our grid has held up pretty well this time around.

yurishimo 5y ago
It also didn't get nearly as cold as last year, and not for as long. Plus, the providers ramped up production the first evening to the point where wholesale rates were negative to incentivize more usage. Another week+ of 0 degrees would likely have not been as smooth...

Rebelgecko 5y ago

My parents house in California had no electricity for over a week (Christmas through New Year's, and it was sporadic until about Jan 8). I think the state is still doing fine as a tech hub.

kelnos 5y ago
I think the point is that if a large portion of Texas currently didn't have power (which seems to not be the case, but whatever), then they might be under-represented in this poll because I imagine fewer people in place without power would be browsing HN than usual.