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| Science & Technology | |
| What is the national power grid and how resilient is it? | |
| 2023-01-21 | |
[FoxNews] Severe weather, targeted attacks threaten US power grid, but system is 'extremely reliable,' according to expert. /sarc
Transmission towers have become increasingly hardened against winds, he said. Some power lines are designed so that if a tree limb falls across them, the lines drop away from the pole rather than dragging down the entire pole which would take much longer to fix. "Part of resiliency is making sure that we don't get those long duration outages by putting in systems that allow us to be able to recover quickly," he said. The national power grid is actually made up of three loosely-connected regions. That's good news when it comes to resiliency because it means if there's a serious problem in the Western interconnection, the Eastern U.S. should be fine, Brooks said. "An issue that starts to happen and hopefully would never actually cascade into a complete blackout, that wouldn't go beyond those individual grids," he said. A diverse array of power sources is also key to grid resiliency, Brooks said. Solar power might perform well during the day, but the benefits vanish when the sun does, so other resources such as nuclear, gas or coal might pick up the slack. "The key is making sure you understand how all of those perform in the context of those needs of the system," he said. "Resiliency, affordability, reliability, sustainability." Shortly after taking office, President Biden committed to making the American economy "net-zero" by 2050. The administration paused new oil and natural gas leases on public lands, among other actions aimed at promoting "green" energy sources. A recent report from an energy watchdog found some utility companies have retired existing fossil fuel power generation before sufficient alternatives were in place, which could result in supply shortfalls. The ambitious decarbonization goals change the way energy experts plan for the future. "Our models basically show that in order to make that happen, the most economic pathways are for the electric grid to be used to help decarbonize the other energy sectors," Brooks said. The electric sector currently fills about 20% of U.S. energy needs, but models show that figure rising as high as 60% by 2050 in order to meet the Biden administration's goals, Brooks said. That means electrifying transportation, industry, commercial operations and homes. "The grid is going to only be increasingly important as we go forward," Brooks said. "We'll have to all continue to work together, to innovate, to invest to make sure that we have those resources that are available for the grid to provide for us as we need." | |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #14 |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2023-01-21 20:00 |
| #13 |
| Posted by: Mullah Richard 2023-01-21 17:59 |
| #12 Electrons don't lie. Thay can be easily manipulated, however. |
| Posted by: Mullah Richard 2023-01-21 17:59 |
| #11 How resilient is the grid? Not very, or you wouldn't ever hear about it. |
| Posted by: ed in texas 2023-01-21 17:17 |
| #10 Did you know Russia is a very large country, and it is located next to Ukraine? Kamela Harris knows. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2023-01-21 17:04 |
| #9 Kamala is an absolute genius and polymath. She's had incredible talks on outer space as well. |
| Posted by: DooDahMan 2023-01-21 12:57 |
| #8 They won’t cut me off the grid as long as I can cogen with my carpet and fluffy socks. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2023-01-21 11:54 |
| #7 Its what you use every time you plug in your air conditioner. Kamela Harris ----------->The More You Know |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2023-01-21 11:51 |
| #6 Until it's hacked. |
| Posted by: DooDahMan 2023-01-21 11:29 |
| #5 Electricity is after all, racist. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2023-01-21 10:25 |
| #4 Gotta put EMP in the equation. Natural and/or man made. |
| Posted by: BrerRabbit 2023-01-21 09:46 |
| #3 Anything but adding more generation. |
| Posted by: Bobby 2023-01-21 09:05 |
| #2 The last National Power Grid ITSEC assessment I was read on, indicated.... IT-Security for the US Interconnected power grids faced serious attack, using only moderate skills and efforts. Due to lack of physical & IT security of 1,000's rural and urban access control points. |
| Posted by: NN2N1 2023-01-21 09:01 |
| #1 It takes a week+ to reestablish power after a hurricane in places use to the weather event. That involves bringing in outside crews and teams from out of state. What happens when its widespread enough those teams are busy at home? It takes much longer. Public Utilities are not authorized by state commissioned to maintain 'fire departments' in large numbers because the cost gets passed to the consumers, who of course bitch about it. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2023-01-21 07:07 |