Re: Did Sean Gorman's maps show the cascading vulnerability in Ohio?
On Sunday 17 August 2003 06:28 pm, Having folded space, the Third Stage Guild Navigator said: > So, the US Government wants to classify Sean Gorman's student project. > The question is did Mr. Gorman's maps divulge the vulnerability in the > East Coast power grid that resulted in the blackouts this week? > > Would it be better to know about these vulnerabilities, and do something > about them; or is it better to keep them secret until they fail in a > catastrophic way? Please correct me if I misunderstand this, but I have a different take on all of this. Power Cos. have for some time traded power in a futures market system. Org A buys x gigawatts at an attractive price to be delivered at a specific time in the future from Org B, via the grid. Org C is facing a brown/blackout today so they are highly motivated to pay any price; Org A's contract terms with Org B fit Org C's needs so Org A makes a killing. Given that the players were producers, buyers and sellers of the same product this creates no incentaive to build out additional capasity. Quite different from say, Hog futures, were the supply side and demand side are not the same person. According the the NPR report I heard on this, the money to be made here is huge provided there was just enough power or not quite enough. So there were not market checks and ballances. having additional capasity on hand, in this system, drives down price in a futures market. So back on Sean's question, maps did not divulge this; at least not the primary cause. I see the primary cause as economic. It seems to me we are seeking a mechanical cause instead of looking at the fauly business model that allowed this to happen.
Re: East Coast outage?
On Sunday 17 August 2003 03:11 pm, Having folded space, the Third Stage Guild Navigator said: > On zondag, aug 17, 2003, at 20:57 Europe/Amsterdam, > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Sure, a regular house has enough surface area to generate this > electricity, but not appartment buildings or businesses. But why have > the hydrogen in the middle? Batteries aren't as explosive. Also, it > seems that the large amount of hydrogen that will leak out (remember, > tinyiest molecules ever, but this is well established for other gasses > as well) don't do the environment much good. Yep. Batt rooms do go boom if not vented. However you loose quite a bit in the charge/recharge cycles. i have not worked with the gel or sealed batts that don't leak anything. When I was off the grid, I factored in the costs to transport them vs the cheap marine deep cycle batts 30 miles away at Wal Mart and the cheap ones won. > > I don't think wholesale replacement of our current power systems is an > attainable goal in our lifetime. (And it will happen automatically > anyway as oil starts running out and gets so expensive that people who > just want to burn it can't afford it anymore.) However, it is still a > very good idea to add more solar energy to the mix, both on the large > and the small ends of the scale. > > Small: a few solar panels (with batteries) will give you at least > _some_ power when the utility power is out. Being able to recharge your > cell phone, run a light, a laptop and an ADSL or cable modem is much, > much better than nothing. > > Large: demand for power peaks when it's hot, but generating capacity is > often much lower under these circumstances because river water gets > much warmer so power plants that need this water for cooling can't run > at full capacity. (We could be facing rolling blackouts because of this > soon in Europe.) Guess what: solar panels don't need cooling and their > output is highest when the weather is hot = lots of sunshine. Totally agree. Some here seem to be taking this as an all or nothing. So much high fat thinking going on. It's gotta be big and it has to feed the status quo greed where the few make the money. I learned, while off the grid, that if I made better choices (with my energy appliances) I did not have to suffer. You do pay more for devices that do the same work with less power. Cheap things wear out sooner. last time I checked my NG fridge is still keeping the ice cream rock hard and the person I sold it to is very happy. All it takes is a candle sized flame. Presently now in the grid, however my landlord placed all windows on the south side. In northern New Mexico I require no heat during the day time, in winter, and can make it most of the time with a little heat from the air tight. I simlpe walk in the woods yields all the wood I need; the cat powered bed warmers do the rest. > > > So, put them on your roof. Lots of unused space. No need to have huge > > expanses for centralized generation. I've read of Solar Cells as > > building > > materials, using the Cells as the shell of the house. > > There has recently been a breakthrough that makes it possible to > convert more of the sun's spectrum into electricity. This could > potentially double the efficiency of solar cells in the future, then > maybe they'll be more cost efficient.
Re: East Coast outage?
On Sunday 17 August 2003 11:55 am, Having folded space, the Third Stage Guild Navigator said: > > Use hydrogen. One solar panel (which will last forever unless you drop > > something on it) can split H2O into H and O. Store the H for windless > > days or at night. Feed this to a turbine for electricity and recover heat > > for hot water, store it in a heat sink, ect. Or feed the H into a fuel > > cell & > > What kind of land area of solar panels do you plan to produce enough H for > producing a gigawatt 24/7? Then multiply that by 60. You probably have to > produce H equivivalent of 180GW to accommodate for nights and cloudier > days, even if you would be somewhere where it usually shines. > > If you want to add windmills to the equation, do the land area calculation > taking into account turbulence effects which mandate your mill spacing. > > Pete The calculations I have seen of hydrogen produced vs watts in indicate solar could supply enough hydrogen to more than satisfy the requirements of a residential user. To calculate the theoretical (maximum) volume of the hydrogen produced, also in cubic meters, from the other data for the current and the time, using "Faraday's First Law": Vtheoretical = (R I T t) / (F p z), where R=8.314 Joule/(mol Kelvin), I = current in amps, T is the temperature in Kelvins (273 + Celsius temperature), t = time in seconds, F = Faraday's constant = 96485 Coulombs per mol, p = ambient pressure = about 1 x 105 pascals (one pascal = 1 Joule/meter3), z = number of "excess" electrons = 2 (for hydrogen, H2), 4 (if you're measuring oxygen production instead). 6 hours sunlight, ave (it's 7.1 here in new mexico) 4 120 watt panels, so: 8.914* 28*303*21600=1.633529e+09 96485*105*2= 20261850 80.620965 cubic meters of hydrogen a day Kyocera KC-120's are 1242mm by 652 mm So, put them on your roof. Lots of unused space. No need to have huge expanses for centralized generation. I've read of Solar Cells as building materials, using the Cells as the shell of the house. Sorry, I do not have a formula to factor in the Exxon Valdez damage, other damage to our enrironment, billions lost last week, ect !
Re: East Coast outage?
On Saturday 16 August 2003 04:54 pm, Having folded space, the Third Stage Guild Navigator said: > Thus spake "Petri Helenius" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > > > subsidize) local power generation via renewable energy sources (e.g. > > > > solar, wind, hydro) it would go a long way towards solving this > > problem. > > > > Rubbish. > > > > > > If in order to make it viable such energy needs to be subsidized then > > > it > > is > > > > not "affordable". > > > > And solar nor wind are good for base energy production so we´re stuck > > with other methods unless you want to move IP packets only when it´s > > windy. > > Or you store excess power generated on windy/sunny days for later > distribution on calm/rainy days: > http://www.tva.gov/sites/raccoonmt.htm > > That still ignores tidal, hydro, and geothermal power, which are available > 24x7. And let's not forget ethanol, which is easy to make from excess food > crops and has already replaced gasoline entirely in a few countries. Use hydrogen. One solar panel (which will last forever unless you drop something on it) can split H2O into H and O. Store the H for windless days or at night. Feed this to a turbine for electricity and recover heat for hot water, store it in a heat sink, ect. Or feed the H into a fuel cell & strip off the electron volts. Now a home user can produce wattage to supply power for his neighbors. The amount of power to be had via these hydrogen processes is huge. Now, try to take out this decentralized power system. You can't, at least not on the scale we saw last week. The by-products of this are water and Oxygen. Hydrogen is our new battery. Please don't go on about it's storage dangers ! LPG (bottle gas) has been used for quite some time and the safety is . We all drive mobile hydrogen bombs, and show no concern. The only problem is that the Oil men are in charge. They want to pipe NG to houses and have us crack NG into hydrogen. Cut the cord ! To stay on topic, consider the long term savings in generating DC directly, via a clean source, instead of converting AC to DC at colos. We pay dearly for the amps on those A and B legs. Replace the multiple utility service feeds, gennys, batt rooms, and DC chargers with a hydrogen feed turbine for each leg. Recover the heat for cooling. < end of rant by long haired *nix based hippie >
Re: East Coast outage?
On Saturday 16 August 2003 03:58 pm, Having folded space, the Third Stage Guild Navigator said: > http://www.hydro.mb.ca/our_facilities/ts_nelson.shtml > > - Original Message - > From: "Chris Adams" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Sent: Friday, August 15, 2003 10:48 PM > Subject: Re: East Coast outage? > > > Once upon a time, Iljitsch van Beijnum <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: > > > Maybe a stupid question... > > > > > > But what if the huge distribution systems used DC and the whole thing > > > was only converted to AC close to the users in small installations? > > > This would get rid of the frequency problems. > > > > Basic physics. To run DC at the power levels required, the "wire" would > > have to be over 100 feet in diameter IIRC. Look up the Edison vs. Tesla > > power arguments for all kinds of information on AC vs. DC. Huh ? Where in the physics of ohms law is Hz a factor ? Having lived off the grid, where systems are often at max 48v, yes the wires have to be several 0's of gage to carry the lagre amperages. Much the same in A/B DC legs in a colo. Up the volts and the amps go down to produce the same power (watts or work). I am a little rusty on this one, but I seem to remember that AC travels only on the outside skin of the wire but DC uses all the wire.
