670 million without power in India

Quiksilver

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/31/uk-india-blackout-idUSLNE86U01G20120731

Wonder how many of them have flashlights? :)

Wonder how many of them have a lifestyle that requires a flashlight to maintain in a blackout.







Overpopulation2.jpg
 
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StarHalo

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Roughly 500 million Indians have no grid to speak of, so while this blackout sounds bad, their "normal" is actually a lot worse..
 

Sub_Umbra

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"...coming to a city near you..."

EDIT-

I didn't mean to be flip but I'm sleep deprived and in reading the comments of the Indian officials I cannot see any difference in what US officials say when there's a big outage.

...it's crap.
 
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AnAppleSnail

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1. Power outages are reported as 'customers.' A power customer is a power bill (Family of ??)
2. Power outages often cascade...like all engineering failures, they find the path with worst maintenance.
3. This is why hospitals have generators...and hope that they have enough fuel.
4. Speeches after the power goes out don't do much to help!
 

blasterman

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Asia's third-largest economy suffers a peak-hour power deficit of about 10 percent, dragging on economic growth.

Ouch. That's a big problem for such a growing economy.

I know the U.S. suffers from an aging grid as well, but the difference is demand has actually fallen in some parts of the country.
 

AnAppleSnail

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...Demand has actually fallen in some parts of the country.

Unfortunately, this reduces power company revenues, which can't be good for maintenance budgets. Progress Energy recently tried a big merger in the Southeast US, but they're already being accused of plans to reduce maintenance work.
 

Hooked on Fenix

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Forget about maintenance work, power supplies have not kept up with demand. In fact, power supplies are dwindling in the U.S.. San Onofre is permanently offline in southern CA, which was 20% of San Diego's power. After the disaster in Japan, nuclear power will not be increased in the U.S.. Our nuclear plants are all aging and there is no alternative to replace their loss of power in the near future. Coal plants are being shut down across the country do to new E.P.A. regulations and the companies that can afford to are switching to natural gas. The companies that can't afford to switch are going out of business and not being replaced. Wind generators are being run at reduced speeds out of environmental concerns over the birds. They aren't being allowed to run at a rate at which investors get a return on investment. That means electric rates go up and the future investment in wind energy is blown. Solar power is getting cheaper but after paying for the inverter and permits, it still costs 10s of thousands of dollars to power a home. Hydroelectric is on the decline because the entire country is in a drought. San Francisco will be voting this year on whether or not to recycle the water from Hetch Hetchy, a valley next to Yosemite that will soon be drained. This is not only their water supply, but 1% of California's power comes from Hetch Hetchy's hydroelectric dam. That will put a drain on power across the state.
 
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Quiksilver

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USA is going to be literally going dark over the next 25 years.

Only modern country in the world where blackouts are still common, and even increasing in frequency!

At least the banks are healthy. ;)
 

Steve K

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Coal plants are being shut down across the country do to new E.P.A. regulations and the companies that can afford to are switching to natural gas.

I've heard of coal companies losing business to natural gas , as natural gas has been cheaper for electricity production nowadays. Switching to natural gas would also greatly reduce emissions, especially for some of the nastier stuff that results from coal burning, such as mercury. Conversion from coal to natural gas is a lot simpler than replacing that electrical production with nuclear or wind power, so I can't see a problem here. Even without the cost of changing to natural gas, it's not as if it no one has ever upgraded a coal power plant to meet EPA standards. Unless demand for electricity is dropping, it seems that the market wouldn't reduce the supply. This sounds a lot like the standard complaints by the coal industry whenever something impacts their profits.

Wind generators are being run at reduced speeds out of environmental concerns over the birds. They aren't being allowed to run at a rate at which investors get a return on investment. That means electric rates go up and the future investment in wind energy is blown.

Are you saying that there are environmental regulations that require running at reduced speeds? Can you provide some details on those regulations? I can find info on the web that discusses increasing the minimum wind speed for operating wind turbines in order to reduce bat mortality, but it doesn't mention any regulations.
Is there published data on the investment return on wind power? I've heard various arguements that wind power is just a losing investment without subsidies. I'd be interested in hearing some objective data on what the profitability of wind turbines actually is, relative to other power sources.

Steve K.
 

Hooked on Fenix

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Are you saying that there are environmental regulations that require running at reduced speeds? Can you provide some details on those regulations? I can find info on the web that discusses increasing the minimum wind speed for operating wind turbines in order to reduce bat mortality, but it doesn't mention any regulations.
Is there published data on the investment return on wind power? I've heard various arguements that wind power is just a losing investment without subsidies. I'd be interested in hearing some objective data on what the profitability of wind turbines actually is, relative to other power sources.

Steve K.

I didn't say there were environmental regulations for wind power. I said environmental concerns. Lawsuits are springing up over the possibility of birds being killed. As a result, whether by court decision or pressure from the public, many wind farms have reduced speeds of their wind turbines to satisfy protesters. At reduced speeds, wind generators only produce a small fraction of what they should running at optimal speeds. As a result, companies investing in the technology are losing money.
 

Sub_Umbra

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...Is there published data on the investment return on wind power? I've heard various arguements that wind power is just a losing investment without subsidies. I'd be interested in hearing some objective data on what the profitability of wind turbines actually is, relative to other power sources.

Steve K.
I haven't found any EROI figures for wind. Here are some figures from an Oil Drum article that come at it from another direction -- the cost of the product in kWh:


"...The problem is that the price of wind is vastly higher than the price of the fuel it is replacing. With delivered coal and natural gas in the $.020 to $.030 (per kWh) range, while the cost of new wind production is $.130 to $.220 per kWh, new wind production is four to ten times as expensive as the cost of the fuel it is replacing..."

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5447

Parens in quote mine.
 
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Steve K

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I didn't say there were environmental regulations for wind power. I said environmental concerns. Lawsuits are springing up over the possibility of birds being killed. As a result, whether by court decision or pressure from the public, many wind farms have reduced speeds of their wind turbines to satisfy protesters. At reduced speeds, wind generators only produce a small fraction of what they should running at optimal speeds. As a result, companies investing in the technology are losing money.

Can you offer any documentation of wind farms actually doing this? I only found info on changing the speed at which the wind turbines were allowed to operate (i.e. not running them below xx mph wind), with the goal of reducing bat fatalities. Didn't come across anything being done to save birds. Running the wind turbines only at lower wind speeds is the exact opposite of what is being proposed to help bats. The wind turbines operate at a fairly consistent rpm regardless of wind speed, so not running at higher wind speeds won't affect the blade speed and the ability of birds to detect the blades, but might reduce how many hours per day the turbine operates.

Steve K>
 

Steve K

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I haven't found any EROI figures for wind. Here are some figures from an Oil Drum article that come at it from another direction -- the cost of the product in kWh:


"...The problem is that the price of wind is vastly higher than the price of the fuel it is replacing. With delivered coal and natural gas in the $.020 to $.030 (per kWh) range, while the cost of new wind production is $.130 to $.220 per kWh, new wind production is four to ten times as expensive as the cost of the fuel it is replacing..."

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5447

Parens in quote mine.

too bad the article compares the total cost of wind production against just the cost of coal, instead of the total cost of coal fueled power production. I wonder why they didn't compare the cost of one fuel against the other?? :)

A shame that we don't get to know what all of the costs are, but very few industries are willing to divulge anything but the essentials of what the SEC requires.

Steve K
 
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