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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 16, 2021 10:07:38 GMT -6
No power and it’s single digits in DFW this morning with more winter weather on the way. I will never complain about it getting too hot here again.
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Post by ragan on Feb 16, 2021 10:21:31 GMT -6
Damn. I didn’t know you were down there too. Was thinking about matt@IAA. Sorry to hear, sounds like a tough situation. Got any firewood or anything? When do your local authorities expect to get power back up? |
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Post by EmRR on Feb 16, 2021 10:31:50 GMT -6
It sounds bad there! Over here in NC, last night we had pouring rain at 33 degrees with a thunderstorm. Woke to learn there were tornadoes at the coast, several hours from here. Looks like we may get another ice storm Thurs. Hang in there!
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 16, 2021 10:37:57 GMT -6
Damn. I didn’t know you were down there too. Was thinking about matt@IAA. Sorry to hear, sounds like a tough situation. Got any firewood or anything? When do your local authorities expect to get power back up? Maybe today, maybe tomorrow, maybe one day. TX has no clue as to when it can safely restore its “independent and free from federal oversight and regional cooperation” power grid. Apparently suffering so you can be “self reliant” is the TX way. I love most things Texas but the state government’s stubborn streak isn’t one of them. LOL. |
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 16, 2021 10:39:21 GMT -6
It sounds bad there! Over here in NC, last night we had pouring rain at 33 degrees with a thunderstorm. Woke to learn there were tornadoes at the coast, several hours from here. Looks like we may get another ice storm Thurs. Hang in there! I lived in NC for practically all of my life except for the past 3 1/2 years I have been here. |
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Post by drbill on Feb 16, 2021 10:57:06 GMT -6
I have a buddy moving to DFW in a month or two. Probably looking for a house there now. LOL. Maybe rethinking his move?? Haha! I've been traveling thru TX during those ugly times. It can certainly get dicey. Stay warm, and I hope your studio is powered up!!
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 16, 2021 11:05:55 GMT -6
It’s a great area. This is an anomaly. I am not kidding about the legislature though.
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Post by matt@IAA on Feb 16, 2021 12:15:33 GMT -6
Some random musings.
Texas in general isn’t built for this kind of cold. This was the coldest event in almost 100 years. And not only cold, but how widespread - all of TX as well as other states. Our homes aren’t insulated the way homes up north are, the piping etc isn’t insulated or made for cold. There’s pipes outside and valves outside. A big chunk of houses use inefficient electric heaters. Most homes don’t have a wood burning stove or furnace. 99.9% of the time it isn’t an issue.
Take that and apply it to power plants and wind turbines. Same thing. Power plants can run fine in cold, but you have to design for it. You gotta heat the lube oil, keep the cooling water lines from freezing, the boiler feedwater has to be kept from freezing. Instrument air lines have to be kept from condensation and freezing. Inlet air filters gotta be clear of ice. Coal conveyor belts can’t freeze up. Etc etc etc. That all costs money and doesn’t make sense 99.9% of the time in Texas.
Same with wind turbines. And with the pipelines that transport the natural gas. And the liquid separation that gets the gas ready to ship. And the well heads themselves. And and and.
About 33% of our gas fired power was unable to run because of cold related issues. Gas for heating is prioritized for consumers, so some plants didn’t have sufficient gas - because of all the troubles and high demand temporary and reduced production due to covid19 lull in oil prices and low temps.
Another chunk of coal was offline due to cold. A 1.3GW nuclear reactor went down for a frozen boiler feedwater pump.
Texas enjoys the least expensive electricity in the country, maybe the world (Iceland with their geothermal power probably has us beat!). But this was a one-off long tail event. No one wants to pay more for low probability event reliability. So here we are.
Don’t let anyone tell you it was from reliance on wind. More thermal power failed to run than all the wind capacity combined. Also don’t let anyone tell you it’s because our grid is independent. We have a record of higher reliability with lower prices than any other grid in the nation. Some times bad stuff happens with nature. Nature be crazy.
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Post by svart on Feb 16, 2021 12:34:05 GMT -6
Some random musings. Texas in general isn’t built for this kind of cold. This was the coldest event in almost 100 years. And not only cold, but how widespread - all of TX as well as other states. Our homes aren’t insulated the way homes up north are, the piping etc isn’t insulated or made for cold. There’s pipes outside and valves outside. A big chunk of houses use inefficient electric heaters. Most homes don’t have a wood burning stove or furnace. 99.9% of the time it isn’t an issue. Take that and apply it to power plants and wind turbines. Same thing. Power plants can run fine in cold, but you have to design for it. You gotta heat the lube oil, keep the cooling water lines from freezing, the boiler feedwater has to be kept from freezing. Instrument air lines have to be kept from condensation and freezing. Inlet air filters gotta be clear of ice. Coal conveyor belts can’t freeze up. Etc etc etc. That all costs money and doesn’t make sense 99.9% of the time in Texas. Same with wind turbines. And with the pipelines that transport the natural gas. And the liquid separation that gets the gas ready to ship. And the well heads themselves. And and and. About 33% of our gas fired power was unable to run because of cold related issues. Gas for heating is prioritized for consumers, so some plants didn’t have sufficient gas - because of all the troubles and high demand temporary and reduced production due to covid19 lull in oil prices and low temps. Another chunk of coal was offline due to cold. A 1.3GW nuclear reactor went down for a frozen boiler feedwater pump. Texas enjoys the least expensive electricity in the country, maybe the world (Iceland with their geothermal power probably has us beat!). But this was a one-off long tail event. No one wants to pay more for low probability event reliability. So here we are. Don’t let anyone tell you it was from reliance on wind. More thermal power failed to run than all the wind capacity combined. Also don’t let anyone tell you it’s because our grid is independent. We have a record of higher reliability with lower prices than any other grid in the nation. Some times bad stuff happens with nature. Nature be crazy. Isn't almost 30% of texas power grid in solar and wind? I read that the majority of the wind turbines froze in place and almost 100% of the solar was covered in snow and that accounts for a significant chunk of daily power supply. But anyway, nice to see an impartial take and not the usual politicizing of a natural weather event. |
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Post by Blackdawg on Feb 16, 2021 12:38:24 GMT -6
as someone who lives in this weather all the time(I'm in montana where it was -20 for a good week or so just last week), I do find it a bit amusing to see places not able to deal with it.
But it's not that funny. I hope anyone that is down that way or impacted stays warm and safe. My biggest advice is to stay off the roads if you aren't a seasoned driver. Especially as I'm sure your vehicles are setup for winter driving, why would it? This isn't typical for you.
Stay safe folks!
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Post by svart on Feb 16, 2021 12:57:23 GMT -6
as someone who lives in this weather all the time(I'm in montana where it was -20 for a good week or so just last week), I do find it a bit amusing to see places not able to deal with it. But it's not that funny. I hope anyone that is down that way or impacted stays warm and safe. My biggest advice is to stay off the roads if you aren't a seasoned driver. Especially as I'm sure your vehicles are setup for winter driving, why would it? This isn't typical for you. Stay safe folks! I visited family in Canada a few years ago during their "summer" and I was super pleased that a high temp was something like 75F. They were sweating with fans on.. But no air conditioning in the house. They said it was just a "warm day" and it would pass! I mentioned getting an air conditioner in the house and they scoffed. "Expensive and we'd only need it a couple days once in a while" is what I was told. They wore their occasional sweating as a badge of honor. I invited them down to Atlanta during august to see how they like 95F days.. I didn't even get a response. |
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Post by winetree on Feb 16, 2021 13:00:10 GMT -6
I feel for you Guys.
All's fine in Sunny Southern California.
Seem like all the storms passed us by in Northern California and headed East.
So nice I'm Gonna take the '34 Ford to a car show this weekend.
Stay safe
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Post by matt@IAA on Feb 16, 2021 13:32:52 GMT -6
Isn't almost 30% of texas power grid in solar and wind? I read that the majority of the wind turbines froze in place and almost 100% of the solar was covered in snow and that accounts for a significant chunk of daily power supply. But anyway, nice to see an impartial take and not the usual politicizing of a natural weather event. Around 25% of total capacity is wind and solar but 23 of that 25 is wind. But that’s misleading. If you have a 100 MW wind farm you expect it to make on average 35 MW. If you do that you’re doing well, exactly as intended. So our 20 GW of wind should average 7 or 8 GW. In Jan and Feb we’ve been enjoying a high average of 15 GW, most of it at night (wind blows more at night). At the peak cold Sunday night it was making 8, but last night very little. Tonight should peak at 6 and tomorrow 9 GW. All of that is forecasted, and expected. What wasn’t expected was 35 GW of gas, coal, and nuclear failing when dispatched. The same cold that reduced wind’s output also crippled everything else. But that doesn’t make headlines or good talking points for Tucker Carlson. |
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Post by matt@IAA on Feb 16, 2021 13:45:28 GMT -6
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Post by Blackdawg on Feb 16, 2021 14:35:40 GMT -6
as someone who lives in this weather all the time(I'm in montana where it was -20 for a good week or so just last week), I do find it a bit amusing to see places not able to deal with it. But it's not that funny. I hope anyone that is down that way or impacted stays warm and safe. My biggest advice is to stay off the roads if you aren't a seasoned driver. Especially as I'm sure your vehicles are setup for winter driving, why would it? This isn't typical for you. Stay safe folks! I visited family in Canada a few years ago during their "summer" and I was super pleased that a high temp was something like 75F. They were sweating with fans on.. But no air conditioning in the house. They said it was just a "warm day" and it would pass! I mentioned getting an air conditioner in the house and they scoffed. "Expensive and we'd only need it a couple days once in a while" is what I was told. They wore their occasional sweating as a badge of honor. I invited them down to Atlanta during august to see how they like 95F days.. I didn't even get a response. haha yeah sounds about right! Where I live it'll hit 100º in the summer no problem. High alpine deserts are nuts. hits the 90s all the time july-august And get as low as -30. Pretty crazy to think animals can survive that kind of annual temperature swing. We have some AC units but they only run for like 3 hours a day to cool of the house a bit in the late afternoon. Then just pop the windows open and its great! I was in St Louis for a few years, good lord. Humidity sucked. And that's not even that bad there I'm sure! haha Thats crazy. Pretty interesting to think about that they don't build those facilities for it. I mean it makes sense from a cost perspective but I never really thought about it I guess. The oil stuff in Prudoe Bay doesn't bat an eye in -70 temps. My dad worked there for 32 years. I guess it's cool to know we can build for that kind of stuff. |
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Post by teejay on Feb 16, 2021 15:13:35 GMT -6
I'm in Illinois. We get it all. Last few days have been 0 to -10 below on average, with windchills in the minus teens. "Heatwave" of 11 degrees today...with full sun (not a cloud in the sky). Spring and fall brings rains/flooding/storms and the threat of tornadoes. Summers are dry, temps in the 90s, and 75%-90% humidity. End of last summer we had a 110 mph sustained wind Derecho and a resulting period of days with no power due to downed trees/lines. Winters are cold with plenty of snow and ice storms, thunder snow, salt to ruin your vehicle, and drivers who seem to forget how to handle the roads when that snow first comes. Between the weather and an unpredictable power grid, we are prone to outages.
Four years ago I bought a whole-house, natural gas generator. I highly recommend one. I don't run my studio on it, but regardless of the circumstances I always have air conditioning, heat, light, refrigerated food, and the ability to run everything in my home normally with no constraints. After the Derecho it ran more than 72 hours straight. We've got a high water table, and the sump in my basement runs year-round. If it doesn't have power it's only a matter of hours before there's potential flooding. That's the main reason I got the generator. So we could actually go on vacation and not worry about our finished basement (where my studio is as well).
I feel for you in Texas where this is the anomaly and your homes are not equipped.
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 16, 2021 15:45:17 GMT -6
We were just told that we **might** get power back by 5 pm tomorrow. I am beyond frustrated but, at least I have a house that has no power. With in a few blocks from me, there are also people who don’t even have a tent. All things considered we are still very fortunate.
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Post by matt@IAA on Feb 16, 2021 16:30:54 GMT -6
Where I live it'll hit 100º in the summer no problem. High alpine deserts are nuts. hits the 90s all the time july-august And get as low as -30. Pretty crazy to think animals can survive that kind of annual temperature swing. We have some AC units but they only run for like 3 hours a day to cool of the house a bit in the late afternoon. Then just pop the windows open and its great! Thats crazy. Pretty interesting to think about that they don't build those facilities for it. I mean it makes sense from a cost perspective but I never really thought about it I guess. The oil stuff in Prudoe Bay doesn't bat an eye in -70 temps. My dad worked there for 32 years. I guess it's cool to know we can build for that kind of stuff. I spent summers near Ingomar... experienced a 60 degree temp swing in a single day! Crazy. Really neat place though. I worked on a bunch of the gas turbines BP / Hillcorp and ConocoPhilips use on the slope! |
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Post by Blackdawg on Feb 16, 2021 16:39:14 GMT -6
Where I live it'll hit 100º in the summer no problem. High alpine deserts are nuts. hits the 90s all the time july-august And get as low as -30. Pretty crazy to think animals can survive that kind of annual temperature swing. We have some AC units but they only run for like 3 hours a day to cool of the house a bit in the late afternoon. Then just pop the windows open and its great! Thats crazy. Pretty interesting to think about that they don't build those facilities for it. I mean it makes sense from a cost perspective but I never really thought about it I guess. The oil stuff in Prudoe Bay doesn't bat an eye in -70 temps. My dad worked there for 32 years. I guess it's cool to know we can build for that kind of stuff. I spent summers near Ingomar... experienced a 60 degree temp swing in a single day! Crazy. Really neat place though. I worked on a bunch of the gas turbines BP / Hillcorp and ConocoPhilips use on the slope! Yeah we get the 60 or more temp swings in 24 hours a lot haha was almost 50 and then was -15 in two days. That was fun. cool! I worked up there for a summer. But that's it. Pretty interesting place. |
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Post by ragan on Feb 16, 2021 17:05:21 GMT -6
Probably the coldest I’ve ever been was in a high desert situation. I was camping with my then-girlfriend (now wife) out at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico which is around 6200 ft (just looked it up, I was much too dumb to look stuff like that up when I was 20). It was about 85F in the afternoon when we drove out there and hiked around. I don’t know how cold it got overnight but I had only brought this thin, $20 sleeping bag I had and it was...inadequate. I was ok when I went to sleep but by morning I was in a deep freeze. My girlfriend had a nice REI mummy bag (I got one after that) and she was fine. I couldn’t get my muscles to function right for like 24 hours. I think she had to drive the next day because I couldn’t reliably use my arms well. My damn teeth are nearly chattering even now as I think about it.
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Post by seawell on Feb 16, 2021 18:38:38 GMT -6
Four years ago I bought a whole-house, natural gas generator. I highly recommend one. I don't run my studio on it, but regardless of the circumstances I always have air conditioning, heat, light, refrigerated food, and the ability to run everything in my home normally with no constraints. After the Derecho it ran more than 72 hours straight. We've got a high water table, and the sump in my basement runs year-round. If it doesn't have power it's only a matter of hours before there's potential flooding. That's the main reason I got the generator. So we could actually go on vacation and not worry about our finished basement (where my studio is as well). I feel for you in Texas where this is the anomaly and your homes are not equipped. I’m pricing out options for this now. I don’t know what has changed but we’ve lost power here(NC) more in the past 3 years than we did the entire first 13 we lived in this house. I’ve had to completely restock the fridge enough times by now to pay for the whole house generator 🤣 |
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Post by dmo on Feb 16, 2021 19:14:46 GMT -6
Mother in law is down around Houston so we've been keeping close eye on things - glad to hear that those of you affected are staying reasonably safe and warm. Having lived at various times in 10 different states (as well as some unique o'seas environments) long ago learned that even when we try to plan for the unexpected - something will happen that we didn't fully anticipate.
Remember spending weeks on rolling blackouts on Guam post typhoon in early 90's - would get power 2h/day to do essentials like cooking, etc. If you didn't have a stand-by generator you were screwed for the other 22h (and took weeks for stores to get them shipped from stateside). Ever since i've always kept about a 10kW portable available with 20-25 gals gas on hand to tie in and and handle essentials.
Whole house generator is great if you have a "guaranteed uninterrupted" supply like natural gas, where I live now we're on propane and to get more than 36h or so I'd need to add a second tank as it's also heat source. I loose power a few times a year here, usually <6h so the portable gets us by for about 1/20th cost of whole house. Stay safe out there all
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 17, 2021 7:48:35 GMT -6
Well, a literal cold slap in the face of 10 mins of power at approximately 4 am. That makes 10 mins of power for the last 36 hours.
l believe that here in Lewisville the “rolling blackouts” that were supposed to share the burden became “we don’t trust the grid so those of you don’t have power, won’t have power”.
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 17, 2021 8:48:44 GMT -6
As of 8:04 am, we have power but not confident in it lasting
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Post by svart on Feb 17, 2021 9:09:17 GMT -6
Probably the coldest I’ve ever been was in a high desert situation. I was camping with my then-girlfriend (now wife) out at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico which is around 6200 ft (just looked it up, I was much too dumb to look stuff like that up when I was 20). It was about 85F in the afternoon when we drove out there and hiked around. I don’t know how cold it got overnight but I had only brought this thin, $20 sleeping bag I had and it was...inadequate. I was ok when I went to sleep but by morning I was in a deep freeze. My girlfriend had a nice REI mummy bag (I got one after that) and she was fine. I couldn’t get my muscles to function right for like 24 hours. I think she had to drive the next day because I couldn’t reliably use my arms well. My damn teeth are nearly chattering even now as I think about it. I think the two coldest times I've had were both on outdoors trips as well. One was a camping trip, our semi-annual "Locked and loaded" weekend where we would get drunk and shoot guns for a whole weekend. We knew it was going to be a little cold but despite the forecast saying it would stay in the 40's overnight it dropped to something like 25F. My sleeping bag was not rated for that and I tried to sleep with all my clothes on inside of this light sleeping bag for one of the worst night's sleep ever. Another time was hiking around the Mono Lake area in late september, which is a notoriously fickle time of year for weather out there. The forecast showed 60F until evening then it would cool down and snow would come in above 9000 feet, so I was wearing shorts and a light jacket. I did bring a rain jacket in my pack just in case. I wasn't feeling great that morning so when we started out around 8000' and had to climb almost 1500' to get to the main trail. I wasn't feeling the 6 miles out into actual wilderness and then 6 miles back so we looked at the map we brought and saw a 7 mile (total) ridge trail that looked like it could have great scenery (it was some of the most beautiful scenery). We started out and the first 2 miles were serene alpine creeks, scrub, aspens, etc, but the trail continued to rise in altitude. At some point around 3-4 miles in GPS said we were closer to 10.5Kft in altitude and the clouds started to roll in. I was starting to have trouble catching my breath due to the altitude but we were close to the halfway point! So we went another mile, and another 1K feet up. The rain moved in and the cold air came in too and it started to sleet and snow on us. The trail continued to go up and up and up.. and also got more rugged and less clear. At one point we came around a bend in the trail, which was on the slope of which looked to be at least a 500ft rock fall and the trail was gone. Gone. The rock fall had wiped out the trail for at least 100ft. So we either try to get across or go back 5 miles while we were both soaked with sweat and rain (despite the rain jackets) and freezing. We stopped for a few minutes to gather thoughts, which is hard to do when you're in the early stages of hypothermia. It also makes your muscles extremely tight and tired so stopping was a pretty poor idea at this point. We did manage to eat some of our food and hydrate but it was getting colder and wetter and trying to get across the wet rocks was going to be hazardous in a foggy state of mind with seizing muscles. We decided to just go for it as the weather would only get worse and we'd only get more tired. BTW, this is certified wilderness. Open country with no emergency services, and no cell service.. We're getting out of this on our own or not at all. It took a good 30 minutes to carefully get across this rockfall but we did it without much issue. Rounding another bend, the trail started to wind down the side of another rock fall but once we started going down, the lower altitude started making everything feel so much better, and it warmed up considerably too. Overall it was about 7 hours of being one of the coldest I've ever been, also one of the highest altitude (about 11k high). On our way out of the trailhead at the other end of the trail, a guy was walking down the road and he stopped and looked at us and said "were you two just up on the ridge trail?" "yeah, we were just up there".. He then said "Wow, nobody does that trail anymore.. It's way too dangerous."  |
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