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The link is to their poweroutage.us, but they also cover Canada (https://poweroutage.com/ca https://poweroutage.com/ca), the UK (https://poweroutage.com/uk http

The link is to their poweroutage.us, but they also cover Canada (https://poweroutage.com/ca https://poweroutage.com/ca), the UK (https://poweroutage.com/uk https://poweroutage.com/uk) and the EU (https://poweroutage.com/eu https://poweroutage.com/eu). For some reason they don't link to these from the US site. Really interesting data, particularly when you compare the very low level of outages in Canada/UK compared with the US.

scrlk 2y ago
The UK regulator introduced the Interruptions Incentive Scheme in 2002 to encourage distribution networks to reduce customer interruptions and minutes lost. It triggered a large wave of investment in network automation (remote switching, auto reclosers etc.)
- Scoundreller 2y ago
  So basically the difference between 9s is investment/cost. At least here (Canada), utils push all of their costs to end-users & IIUC have an incentive to have high capex/low opex networks because of regulated return. As a Canadian residential electrical customer, we pay a lot in base fees from what I hear relative to US customers. Sure it's more reliable, but tbh, it's not worth spending much to get 5 9s (5 mins of downtime a year) vs 4 9s (50 minutes/yr). Heck, even 500 minutes/yr would be fine for me. But commercial/industrial users won't feel the same way, and managed to successfully spread the cost of adding 9s among users that largely don't care.
  - icegreentea2 2y ago
    Btw, at least for Ontario and Quebec, current average downtime is below 4 9s, and quite close to your quoted 500m/yr time. Ontario's Energy Board has a dashboard (https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiNmY1YjU0NmUtMTJhYi00NmVhLWJlYzMtNDE4NTcxNDZmNGZmIiwidCI6Ijc0MTNjMjNjLWE3MjUtNDEzNC04OTQ2LTExMGZmMWUyZDBlNiJ9 https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiNmY1YjU0NmUtMTJhYi00N...) that says in 2023, total average outage time was ~5hrs (and that's somewhat typical of the last 10ish years). Hydro Quebec says that in 2023 (https://www.hydroquebec.com/data/documents-donnees/pdf/hqd-03-01-performance.pdf?v=2024-04-22 https://www.hydroquebec.com/data/documents-donnees/pdf/hqd-0... FR sorry) the average downtime was ~4.5 hours.
  - cavisne 2y ago
    Its the same in the US. Except for texas which does some slightly more innovative things. Its really hard to do anything else than overbuild, Texas was strongly criticized for underbuilding its network when there was an ice storm a few years ago.

scrlk 2y ago

The UK regulator introduced the Interruptions Incentive Scheme in 2002 to encourage distribution networks to reduce customer interruptions and minutes lost. It triggered a large wave of investment in network automation (remote switching, auto reclosers etc.)

Scoundreller 2y ago
So basically the difference between 9s is investment/cost. At least here (Canada), utils push all of their costs to end-users & IIUC have an incentive to have high capex/low opex networks because of regulated return. As a Canadian residential electrical customer, we pay a lot in base fees from what I hear relative to US customers. Sure it's more reliable, but tbh, it's not worth spending much to get 5 9s (5 mins of downtime a year) vs 4 9s (50 minutes/yr). Heck, even 500 minutes/yr would be fine for me. But commercial/industrial users won't feel the same way, and managed to successfully spread the cost of adding 9s among users that largely don't care.
- icegreentea2 2y ago
  Btw, at least for Ontario and Quebec, current average downtime is below 4 9s, and quite close to your quoted 500m/yr time. Ontario's Energy Board has a dashboard (https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiNmY1YjU0NmUtMTJhYi00NmVhLWJlYzMtNDE4NTcxNDZmNGZmIiwidCI6Ijc0MTNjMjNjLWE3MjUtNDEzNC04OTQ2LTExMGZmMWUyZDBlNiJ9 https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiNmY1YjU0NmUtMTJhYi00N...) that says in 2023, total average outage time was ~5hrs (and that's somewhat typical of the last 10ish years). Hydro Quebec says that in 2023 (https://www.hydroquebec.com/data/documents-donnees/pdf/hqd-03-01-performance.pdf?v=2024-04-22 https://www.hydroquebec.com/data/documents-donnees/pdf/hqd-0... FR sorry) the average downtime was ~4.5 hours.
- cavisne 2y ago
  Its the same in the US. Except for texas which does some slightly more innovative things. Its really hard to do anything else than overbuild, Texas was strongly criticized for underbuilding its network when there was an ice storm a few years ago.