[dohboi]

Please do let us know about any developments in your research, shortonoil.

Really good point, burtonridr. Probably the last drops of oil will be used to prop up an increasingly fragile, ever shrinking, and more and more accident-prone and intermittent electirc grid.

There are no cheery future scenarios, but if we are going to have any distributed energy in the future, it will likely mostly be electric while it lasts.

[shortonoil]

dohboi said:

Please do let us know about any developments in your research, shortonoil.

Really good point, burtonridr. Probably the last drops of oil will be used to prop up an increasingly fragile, ever shrinking, and more and more accident-prone and intermittent electirc grid.

There are no cheery future scenarios, but if we are going to have any distributed energy in the future, it will likely mostly be electric while it lasts.

Thank you dohboi, I certainly will. Time is the limiting factor, I am also trying to prepare, among other things, for the crisis that will soon be on us.

What burtonridr implied will certainly be true. The electrical grid will get the last available resources in the attempt to keep it running. In essence it is the only chance we have of maintaining an advanced technological society. If it goes, we really will be back to pounding the rocks together. For that reason all other in-battles will be forgotten. A common enemy is unifying.

[dohboi]

Well put, amen, and best of luck.

[roccman]

dohboi said:

Please do let us know about any developments in your research, shortonoil.

Really good point, burtonridr. Probably the last drops of oil will be used to prop up an increasingly fragile, ever shrinking, and more and more accident-prone and intermittent electirc grid.

There are no cheery future scenarios, but if we are going to have any distributed energy in the future, it will likely mostly be electric while it lasts.

Thank you dohboi, I certainly will. Time is the limiting factor, I am also trying to prepare, among other things, for the crisis that will soon be on us.

What burtonridr implied will certainly be true. The electrical grid will get the last available resources in the attempt to keep it running. In essence it is the only chance we have of maintaining an advanced technological society. If it goes, we really will be back to pounding the rocks together. For that reason all other in-battles will be forgotten. A common enemy is unifying.

Had a very interesting lunch with a utility electrical engineer last week.

The grid is not well at all.

We are going back to roccland...really.

[shortonoil]

]Had a very interesting lunch with a utility electrical engineer last week. The grid is not well at all. We are going back to roccland...really.

I can certainly share your pessimism roc, the grid is in terrible shape. I also have a friend who is a power plant manager, and what he tells me will curl your hair. But the grid is unlike a strictly mechanical devise, if you cut down the load you can run them almost indefinitely with minimal maintenance

The days of three large screen TVs, three computers that never get turned off, a heated driveway, heated pool, washer/drier pulling 2000 watts, and totally air conditioned and heated home are fast coming to an end. Those things are unnecessary amenities as people will soon learn. You don’t need 200 amps to run a house. For decades most homes were wired with 60 amp entrances, and people survived just fine.

I have an old house here in Virginia that I use as a writing studio. It has a 60 amp entrance that is an old Wadsworth box (1930 vintage) with a fuse cartridge type disconnect. The house is wired with BX K&T, the old rosin impregnated cloth wound wire. It takes some work, but I can keep it functioning. You just have to learn that you can’t load a circuit down very much; turn things off before turning something else on.

Our standard of living is certainly going to change in the near future (some would say crash). The pampered days of the last 50 years are rapidly coming to an end, and people will again have to learn what it means to be self sufficient. That in itself is not a bad thing. A society that can again learn a little self esteem without having to look at their check book, and 401K plan will probably be quite a relief.

We’ll certainly hear about all the trials and tribulations of the populous from the media. Soon, however, people will start to say “stop all the whining”! “Get the garden planted, get out the wash board, and shut the dam light off”!

[Starvid]

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

[strider3700]

Canada's electrical grid isn't is the greatest shape either.

The undersea cables providing 70% of the electricity to Vancouver island have hit the end of their expected life at this point. There are protests going on about putting in new high voltage cables on the mainland. There was just a serious fire that left a large part of downtown Vancouver with no power for days.

I think everyone has been cutting corners for decades preventing maintenance rather then spend the bucks and be prepared for the future

[bruce2288]

[Spending money to maintane infrastructure is not sexy. I saw a few weeks ago these fake water falls in NY harbour, the mayor talking about how cool it was. My first thought was the steam pipe explosions last year and thought was maybe they should have spent the money repairing the sewer or water system.. But that probably would not have gotten a photo op and shown how hip NY is. PS All I saw was a tall scaffolding with a big hose spraying water. Not to inspiring to me, but guess I'm not hip

[burtonridr]

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

Its not that it is in bad shape currently, it is just over extended and it costs a lot of money to maintain the current system without the added cost of oil prices.

I'm sure the current system could continue to provide power to most people for a good decade without to many problems. That is assuming zero population growth, which will never happen. But when you throw in an ice storm here and an earth quake there.... Well the cost to repair lines, poles, transformers, etc will be what kills it or just makes it unreliable.

Think about just how large the power grid it right now.... Do you think it could have ever grown to that size without cheap oil? Hell no!

It will suffer the same fate as everything else as soon as things begin to go south.

[shortonoil]

Starvid said:

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

It is called de-regulation. Utilities were guaranteed a good % profit prior to the overhaul in public utility law. We were told that the changes would reduce cost to the consumer by making a more efficient and competitive system. It didn’t work. Stockholders wanted that extra profits in their bank accounts, instead of in new projects and upgrades. Prices went up and quality of service went down,

This occurred about the time that big money interests bought the rest of the US government.

[Kingcoal]

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

I was not aware that the rest of the world had no issues with their electrical grids. In this country, it's regional. For example, a couple of years ago there was a huge cascading blackout that covered most of the Northeast out to Chicago and parts of Canada. I live 120 miles from NYC (which in America is a hop skip and a jump) and didn't find out about the blackout until I watched the news that night. The reason is because of the brand new computer system just deployed in my State (PA.) The software detected the overload and instantly disconnect from those parts of the grid, keeping our power on, while NYC was in darkness for most of the day.

I think that the whole grid should be rebuilt using super conducting technology. That would enable fantastic amounts of power to be transmitted very long distances at almost no loss through very tiny SC conductors. One SC line could take the place of several towers using conventional technology. Not only would that drastically increase capacity by itself, but also sets the stage for large scale renewables projects, such as covering the Mojave Desert with photovoltaics. The real problem with typical electrical transmission technology these days is the huge losses that occur when power is transorted long distances.

So there, IMO, any electrical grid that can't transmit electricity at low loss for a thousand miles is in bad shape and in need of upgrade.

[Twilight]

You don’t need 200 amps to run a house. For decades most homes were wired with 60 amp entrances, and people survived just fine.

Interesting you should mention that. In the UK, most houses remain fitted for 50-60A unless upgraded by the owner, and I doubt that changed during the house price bubble, during which unlike in the US, new builds tended downwards in size. This strikes me particularly when reading layman's conversions in press articles about generation capacity. When talking about the UK, they typically read "x MW, enough power for y homes," where x/y tends to be 1 - 1.5kW. When talking about the US, that ratio is often as high as 3kW.

[Starvid]

[Spending money to maintane infrastructure is not sexy. I saw a few weeks ago these fake water falls in NY harbour, the mayor talking about how cool it was. My first thought was the steam pipe explosions last year and thought was maybe they should have spent the money repairing the sewer or water system.. But that probably would not have gotten a photo op and shown how hip NY is. PS All I saw was a tall scaffolding with a big hose spraying water. Not to inspiring to me, but guess I'm not hip

My best friends uncle is an architect who has worked on those waterfalls. Thanks for your tax dollars.

[Starvid]

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

Its not that it is in bad shape currently, it is just over extended and it costs a lot of money to maintain the current system without the added cost of oil prices.

So pay the money and don't be a bunch of whining pussies (not refering to the members of this board). It's a tiny annual sum when maintenance is split on 300 million people. After all if we can do it, so can you.

Think about just how large the power grid it right now.... Do you think it could have ever grown to that size without cheap oil? Hell no!

Of course it could. We built a large fraction not only before we had cheap oil, but before we had oil at all (except the military). Not only that, but the second large way of investment in the power sector in this country came during the second oil crisis, in a time of expensive oil.

It will suffer the same fate as everything else as soon as things begin to go south.

I agree. But not the way you meant it.

[Starvid]

Starvid said:

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

It is called de-regulation. Utilities were guaranteed a good % profit prior to the overhaul in public utility law. We were told that the changes would reduce cost to the consumer by making a more efficient and competitive system. It didn’t work. Stockholders wanted that extra profits in their bank accounts, instead of in new projects and upgrades. Prices went up and quality of service went down,

This occurred about the time that big money interests bought the rest of the US government.

Oh yes, the wonders of deregulation. Our grid (at least the backbone 220 kV and 400 kV lines) is run and owned by a government authority. Works brilliantly.

Check it out here (in english): http://www.svk.se/web/Page.aspx?id=5214

[Starvid]

Why is the grid in the US in such a bad shape while it is in excellent shape in the rest of the developed world?

I was not aware that the rest of the world had no issues with their electrical grids. In this country, it's regional. For example, a couple of years ago there was a huge cascading blackout that covered most of the Northeast out to Chicago and parts of Canada. I live 120 miles from NYC (which in America is a hop skip and a jump) and didn't find out about the blackout until I watched the news that night. The reason is because of the brand new computer system just deployed in my State (PA.) The software detected the overload and instantly disconnect from those parts of the grid, keeping our power on, while NYC was in darkness for most of the day.

I think that the whole grid should be rebuilt using super conducting technology. That would enable fantastic amounts of power to be transmitted very long distances at almost no loss through very tiny SC conductors. One SC line could take the place of several towers using conventional technology. Not only would that drastically increase capacity by itself, but also sets the stage for large scale renewables projects, such as covering the Mojave Desert with photovoltaics. The real problem with typical electrical transmission technology these days is the huge losses that occur when power is transorted long distances.

So there, IMO, any electrical grid that can't transmit electricity at low loss for a thousand miles is in bad shape and in need of upgrade.

Huge losses? We transmit huge amounts of power from the north of the country to the south and our losses are definitely not higher than 10 %. More like 5 %.

What does these super conducting things cost? Is the tech mature enough for the market? So why is it not used? I'm sure Siemens, GE and ABB would sell it if it was good enough.

[gnm]

What does these super conducting things cost? Is the tech mature enough for the market? So why is it not used? I'm sure Siemens, GE and ABB would sell it if it was good enough.

Heh, the tech is not only not mature enough it doesn't exist yet...



How far are your transmission distances there Starvid, 5-10% losses would be really low.

-G

[Starvid]

What does these super conducting things cost? Is the tech mature enough for the market? So why is it not used? I'm sure Siemens, GE and ABB would sell it if it was good enough.

Heh, the tech is not only not mature enough it doesn't exist yet...



How far are your transmission distances there Starvid, 5-10% losses would be really low.

-G

The main hydro plants in the north should on average be located something like 1000 km from the main consuming areas in the south. This is a rough back of the hand calcualtion made by looking at a map.

Of course, not all power is generated by the massive northern rivers. Half of our power is generated by the nukes, obviously located in the south close to the consumers in the population centers.

[yesplease]

So pay the money and don't be a bunch of whining pussies (not refering to the members of this board). It's a tiny annual sum when maintenance is split on 300 million people. After all if we can do it, so can you.

Nope, it's unpossible. Americans couldn't possibly scrape together enough to maintain the grid. We're going to continue to drive a fleet that gets ~17mpg while paying more for gas, in addition to up to ~$1.7 trillion/year in externalized costs while whining about oil/gas prices. Then, when we have trouble w/ the grid, there will be no-bid contracts to those "willing" to fix it for far more than it would've cost to keep up.

[Starvid]

A map of the Nordic transmission grid, page 2 in English. Not all planned expansions are shown. Also the HVDC (the worlds first, from 1954) to the island of Gotland (the big one next to Oskarshamn and Norrkoping) is not shown.

http://www.svk.se/upload/3756/SVKK030121.pdf

For some more information (if anyone cares reading it) I'll quote Magnus Redin, a member of the Oil Drum who has debated nuclear energy on TV in Sweden.

I am a technology nerd from Sweden with some understanding of economics and politics. The nordic energy problems, and opportunities, are handled with market pricing plus heavy taxation.

We have one of the worlds most unregulated electricity trading markets:
www.nordpool.com

The heavy taxation were originally purely fiscal and have then also been motivated by environmental reasons.

Other market manipulations that have been done is early state involvement in hydro power and large scale grid building and at least in Sweden in nuclear research.

All nordic countries have strong municipialities and manny of them have built local grids and invested in power production. But this is more or less local government acting as a market player in a sane way.

There is a regulation preassure on all power industry to comply to fairly strict codes and this adds to the cost. On the other hand it rewards long term planning and parts of the power industry is sometimes ahead in this, probably people who like to do a good job.

Overall it seems like grid quality is improving but the service is not improving since a lot of the investments is a replacement of repair staff with cabels that dont break down as often.

I think the Swedish grid have about three generations. Pre WW-2, post WW-2 hydro boom and 70/80:s nuclear boom. Pre WW-2 is mostly gone or being replaced real fast now, post WW-2 hydro boom major switchyards are being replaced and almost all of the rural distribution grid is being replaced. A lot of the high voltage nuclear boom switchyards are being updated or rebuilt to get higer reliability and a lot of the rural investments will be redone with only a fraction of the life lenght used to storm proof the distribution.

I guess the period of about 2000 - 2015 will be another major generation in the grid due to cablification and manny investments done for the nordic power trading and better reliability. Hopefulle the period will be ended by additions for new nuclear powerplants in Swden and not only Finland and strenghtening for plug-in hybrids and EV:s and thus lenghten this generation to about 2020.

The major investments in production are both done by established power companies and customers cooperating to build their own production to undercut the oligopolies.

I think most of the energy future is electric, with lots and lots of electricity.

PS. Hey I really like what Magnus is saying about other things too! So for those interested in reading more OT stuff about Sweden, just plow on.

"expat" who seems to be an American, says:

'But this is more or less local government acting as a market player in a sane way.'

For most Americans who have grown up in the last generation, this statement is essentially incomprehensible. Government is the opposite of market, the same way day is the opposite of night.

Which may explain why Americans so often deride Europe's over-regulated socialist economy, with its maternity leave, essentially universal health care, 4-6 weeks paid vacation per year, safety regulations, and on, and on.

Both systems have flaws, but one seems oriented to the long term, taking into account multiple factors, while the other seems oriented to the rich getting richer as proof that it is superior.

To which Magnus responds:

And it is correct that over regulating and toying with socialism can be very hurtfull for your economy and the well being for a countries citizens.

Our luck in Sweden has probably been that previous generations only socialized some sectors and then slowly started to back off. We now need to hurry up with that since we need more efficiency.

The more theoretical and ideological your socialism is the worse it becommes. The early generations of socialists in Sweden had a practical mindsets and a lot of what were done where simply about building things in an efficient way intended do be lived in by those in charge and the rest of the people. One of the major problems with that is that those in charge dont have the same taste and wishes as everybody else. This mindset dont work well when you do something more complex then clean water, distributing electricity or paving roads. Thus manny of our cities look like they were bombed during WW-2 when in reality they were redeveloped for the common good, a disaster wich will take further decades to repair.

Things started to go south in the late 60:s when socialism should equalize man, should be extended to include private companies and should transform children into realy happy and equalized citizens. It had been so successfull in so much so they probably felt it to be logical to extend the project.

Dident work and it is quite a lot of work to get childcare, schools, hospitals, etc to start to function in a more efficient way and get all those people who thought it were a good idea to rethink it.

Myself as a right wing hobby politician I have a kind of two front battle since I advocate large government investments and so on in preparation for global warming and peak oil while at the same time wanting to back off in other sectors and redistribute the funds. Arguing for bigger government in some sectors and smaller in other is hard since it no longer is ideologically simple. At least I am sure that free enterprize is vital for getting things built and run in an efficient way.

Perhaps the difference between our system and yours is that we in Sweden fairly often think about longer time spans of both history and future and have a tradition of some technocracy. If something works or not when you analyze it is fairly often a valid argument and a reasonable share of the general public understands such reasoning.

Well, there you go, much to think about when it comes to Europe/Sweden and how it differs from America. Hell, go read the whole exchange at: http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/12/1/8307/71623