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Solar storm of 1859

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Re: Solar storm of 1859

#21

Post by shubhamjain »

Animats wrote: post #15

Oh, the Carrington Event again. This has been on HN several times. It ought to be on a list of common misconceptions. - This has nothing to do with "EMP". That's a big but brief RF pulse with a rise time around 1ns. This is induced DC in long wires over a period of hours. - The basic effect is that a current is induced in the earth's crust, resulting in a DC voltage between grounds at widely separated points. This is…

Potentially off-topic, but you how do you know so much? It seems that from law to physics to computer science, you have an absurd level of detailed knowledge. It's incredulous that someone can talk at such great depth about an obscure topic from the top of his head.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#22

Post by extrapickles »

starbeast wrote: post #4
nhkssol wrote: post #2

If you're interested in the modern risks of coronal mass injections, there's a report called "Solar Storm Risk to The North American Electrical Grid" [0] (2008) that summarizes the topic well. From page 4: "The total U.S. population at risk of extended power outage from a Carrington-level storm is between 20-40 million, with durations of 16 days to 1-2 years." [0] http://www.lloyds.com/~/media/lloyds/reports/emerging…

We should hurry up with developing power over fiber, now that the new hollow core fibers have been developed that have essentially no transmission losses. Is one of the few power transmission technologies that should be entirely unaffected by solar storms.

You can buy power over fiber systems, but they are not cheap!

Last I checked it was something like $100/watt and was 10-25% efficient (plug-plug). The system I worked on used “standard” fiber as the hollow core stuff still had too many drawbacks.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#24

Post by Animats »

shubhamjain wrote: post #21
Animats wrote: post #15

Oh, the Carrington Event again. This has been on HN several times. It ought to be on a list of common misconceptions. - This has nothing to do with "EMP". That's a big but brief RF pulse with a rise time around 1ns. This is induced DC in long wires over a period of hours. - The basic effect is that a current is induced in the earth's crust, resulting in a DC voltage between grounds at widely separated points. This is…

Potentially off-topic, but you how do you know so much? It seems that from law to physics to computer science, you have an absurd level of detailed knowledge. It's incredulous that someone can talk at such great depth about an obscure topic from the top of his head.

I got interested in this back when California was having blackouts because the power industry managed to convince the legislature that a totally free market with an auction every half hour was the way to run the power grid. I wanted to see how other places did it. PJM has a "day ahead" market and a backup spot market, so generating stations mostly know what tomorrow will be like. California now has something similar.

PJM has online training courses. Taking "PJM 101" is worth it to get a sense of how the market system and the actual operation interact. A few hours and you know more about the power grid than 99% of the population, but less than any PJM employee or energy trader.

One of my interests is how market-based systems fail. They're feedback systems with delays. Some of the delays are short; others are measured in years. A point I make regularly is that such systems have no guarantee of stability. In short-term energy markets, the consequences of this are immediate, because there is not much inventory in electricity.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#25

Post by starbeast »

extrapickles wrote: post #22
starbeast wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should hurry up with developing power over fiber, now that the new hollow core fibers have been developed that have essentially no transmission losses. Is one of the few power transmission technologies that should be entirely unaffected by solar storms.

You can buy power over fiber systems, but they are not cheap! Last I checked it was something like $100/watt and was 10-25% efficient (plug-plug). The system I worked on used “standard” fiber as the hollow core stuff still had too many drawbacks.

I have been wondering about doing power over fiber for sensors, where they don't need much power, but do need an interference free supply. It seems like a good use case as you could presumably put a sensor at the end of a single fiber, then send power up and get data back down.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#26

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

Animats wrote: post #24
shubhamjain wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Potentially off-topic, but you how do you know so much? It seems that from law to physics to computer science, you have an absurd level of detailed knowledge. It's incredulous that someone can talk at such great depth about an obscure topic from the top of his head.

I got interested in this back when California was having blackouts because the power industry managed to convince the legislature that a totally free market with an auction every half hour was the way to run the power grid. I wanted to see how other places did it. PJM has a "day ahead" market and a backup spot market, so generating stations mostly know what tomorrow will be like. California now has something similar.…

Further to the parents comment, do you use a personal knowledge base? I keep a flat text file, but have been pondering whether it might be worth moving to something a bit more structured.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#27

Post by yitchelle »

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #26
Animats wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got interested in this back when California was having blackouts because the power industry managed to convince the legislature that a totally free market with an auction every half hour was the way to run the power grid. I wanted to see how other places did it. PJM has a "day ahead" market and a backup spot market, so generating stations mostly know what tomorrow will be like. California now has something similar.…

Further to the parents comment, do you use a personal knowledge base? I keep a flat text file, but have been pondering whether it might be worth moving to something a bit more structured.

From practicality perspective, how do you use your personal knowledge base? Do you review it on a regular basis?

I have thoughts of keeping a similar database, but I kept thinking "will I ever use the collected details in the future". When I first started in computers on the Atari 8bit in Australia, I would collect as many of its software as possible, due to its scarcity. Looking back on it, I would ever only used 1% of it. The rest would be sitting it on the floppies gathering dust. I fear that the database that I collect would end up in a similar situation.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#28

Post by scandox »

yitchelle wrote: post #27
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Further to the parents comment, do you use a personal knowledge base? I keep a flat text file, but have been pondering whether it might be worth moving to something a bit more structured.

From practicality perspective, how do you use your personal knowledge base? Do you review it on a regular basis? I have thoughts of keeping a similar database, but I kept thinking "will I ever use the collected details in the future". When I first started in computers on the Atari 8bit in Australia, I would collect as many of its software as possible, due to its scarcity. Looking back on it, I would ever only used 1%…

Some people just have an incredible memory. Enviable but not necessarily the brain's only killer app.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#29

Post by kylegordon »

Animats wrote: post #15

Oh, the Carrington Event again. This has been on HN several times. It ought to be on a list of common misconceptions. - This has nothing to do with "EMP". That's a big but brief RF pulse with a rise time around 1ns. This is induced DC in long wires over a period of hours. - The basic effect is that a current is induced in the earth's crust, resulting in a DC voltage between grounds at widely separated points. This is…

> Bitcoin mines

Did not expect to see them in a conversation about electricity infrastructure and aluminium smelters. Interesting times we live in.

Re: Solar storm of 1859

#30

Post by heavenlyblue »

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #26
Animats wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got interested in this back when California was having blackouts because the power industry managed to convince the legislature that a totally free market with an auction every half hour was the way to run the power grid. I wanted to see how other places did it. PJM has a "day ahead" market and a backup spot market, so generating stations mostly know what tomorrow will be like. California now has something similar.…

Further to the parents comment, do you use a personal knowledge base? I keep a flat text file, but have been pondering whether it might be worth moving to something a bit more structured.

I am still thinking of building graph-like knowledge base for myself. Always end up with defining the interface and realising it may be a bit too general.
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