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This electrical transmission tower has a problem

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Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#81

Post by ajmurmann »

free_rms wrote: post #79
tuna-piano wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is that PG&E negligently caused sparks. But many things can negligently cause sparks, including dozens of human and natural causes. Even among power operators, sparks seem to not be too rare (for example, the tree that fell on the line). So while PG&E can be blamed for that specific fire that doesn't really address the root cause of "why can some sparks in one place cause such huge destruction and c…

Many things can crash cars but if you crash one you're liable. If the wildfires in CA were a new thing this season, I wouldn't want to witch hunt this year's culprit. But it's been a huge hazard for years now -- negligent sparks can't be tolerated.

I love the car comparison because I think the comparison to car manufacturers' stance pre-"Unsafe At Any Speed" seems quite fitting. In fact car manufacturers at least had drivers to blame, whereas PG&E can really only blame themselves or "acts of god"

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#82

Post by coagmano »

dakial1 wrote: post #42

Couldn't drones + AI do the inspection work more effectively?

I doubt it would have picked up this failure. That said, I think dones + AI can reduce the cost of routine maintenance, the savings of which shoud be used for infrequent detailed inspections that would pick up a defect like this. More likely the savings will just be pocketed

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#83

Post by rcpt »

dragonwriter wrote: post #51
mjevans wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is plenty of blame to spread around. Regulations should require sufficient redundancy for scheduled outages on individual lines for regularly scheduled service during non-critical times. Communities should not be allowed to form, and should be actively wound down if they are within dangerous areas with seasonal problems. Fires, Floods, Extreme doubts, unsustainable water table use, etc. This should _begin_ at a…

> Communities should not be allowed to form, and should be actively wound down if they are within dangerous areas with seasonal problems. But when we abandon most of the West (earthquake, fire, drought), midwest (flooding, tornados, east and particularly gulf coast (hurricanes), there's a whole lot of economic output lost from working land (farming, mineral extraction, etc.) that won't be replaceable when you crowd t…

California mountain towns are not economically productive. I doubt they could even exist without the rest of the states taxes supporting their infrastructure.

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#85

Post by bhawks »

43920 wrote: post #68
nanodeath wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm...it's unclear whether you read the stream. They had reason to believe that the C-hook would fail after 97-100 years, yet weren't even checking the C-hooks on towers that were 100 years old. That seems willfully negligent.

Right, I should clarify. PG&E absolutely should have known about, and prevented, the specific situation that caused this fire, and the fact they didn't do so is a huge problem. However, the surrounding area is such a high fire risk that a fire almost certainly would have occurred even without this failure (which the thread mentions: https://twitter.com/TubeTimeUS/status/1306377626487894017 ), and so the specific caus…

Climate change shouldn't be used as a get out of jail card free card for catastrophic events like this.

PGE has a very long track record of neglectful behaviours. From leaking chromium into drinking water in socal, san mateo gas main explosion, and the electrical fires in northern California.

There is something very wrong with how PGE approaches it's infrastructure and public safety. It would happen regardless of climate change.

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#86

Post by nullc »

tuna-piano wrote: post #65
nanodeath wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm...it's unclear whether you read the stream. They had reason to believe that the C-hook would fail after 97-100 years, yet weren't even checking the C-hooks on towers that were 100 years old. That seems willfully negligent.

I think the point is that PG&E negligently caused sparks. But many things can negligently cause sparks, including dozens of human and natural causes. Even among power operators, sparks seem to not be too rare (for example, the tree that fell on the line). So while PG&E can be blamed for that specific fire that doesn't really address the root cause of "why can some sparks in one place cause such huge destruction and c…

> But many things can negligently cause sparks, including dozens of human and natural causes.

My favourite: https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-mendocino-compl...

Someone tried to stop an angry yellowjacket nest by driving a concrete stake into the hole in the ground and their hammer thew off sparks and started a 459,123 acre fire-- the largest recorded in state history at the time.

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#87

Post by bhawks »

mrbabbage wrote: post #43
throwaway189262 wrote: post #28

Interesting. I'm kinda sympathetic to PG&E on this though. These big lines don't have much under them, inspection is by helicopter, and the lines cannot be shut down. I would not be surprised if "fix it when it breaks" is a nationwide phenomenon for high tension lines. What makes it bad is how fire-prone California is. I'm of the opinion that humans should not be living in areas that burn regularly. And in PG&E's def…

There is no defense for PG&E for the Camp Fire. This is an organization that is notorious for under-maintaining its assets. Its state of repair is so shoddy that it regularly turns off power for many days at a time ("public safety power shutoffs") to huge swathes of its service area. No other comparable utility does this - not San Diego Gas and Electric, not the Victoria Electricity Cooperative (Australian utility),…

PGE also was responsible for contaminating the ground water in Hinkley California with millions of gallons of chromium in the the 1960s and then covering it up for 20 years.

There is something seriously wrong with PGE and it's attitude towards it's infrastructure and public safety.

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#88

Post by brianpan »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #37
umvi wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like the thread points out though, maintenance is just one piece of the puzzle. There were multiple points of failure here, not just the hook. That's like blaming the welders for the Lebanon explosion when in reality it was a combination of like 4 different fails over the course of many years.

I have no idea what you're talking about. Unless you count "power lines active during dry conditions" which is unavoidable, the only meaningful failure here is repeated lack of maintenance. The design was fine, and it was installed fine; it lasted a hundred years! Lack of maintenance will kill anything eventually, all by itself.

The maintenance was the last thing to fail.

There are always other causes and improvements. From how the maintenance is performed and verified, to how the system works and is designed, to the process and culture of the organization.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_whys

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#89

Post by staticautomatic »

scythe wrote: post #71
43920 wrote: post #60

This is definitely a failure on PG&E's part, but I'm still not sure how much sense it makes to assign them blame for this fire. The environment they're operating in is somewhat ridiculous - the forest is so dry and overgrown that pretty much any flame source will start a fire large enough to burn a huge area; this specific tower failure is basically just the thing that revealed a much larger issue. With proper engine…

It's instructive to consider the alternative. Many US towns expand in a dendritic pattern by branching cul-de-sacs off of interconnecting roads. By contrast pre-Westphalian cities were always built within convex hulls for defensive purposes. These shapes were imitated by early grid-planned US towns built by capitalist pioneers, but after the introduction of the automobile those towns were soon surrounded by irregular…

This is a very interesting analysis. Thanks for providing it.

Re: This electrical transmission tower has a problem

#90

Post by kempbellt »

akira2501 wrote: post #39
throwaway189262 wrote: post #28

Interesting. I'm kinda sympathetic to PG&E on this though. These big lines don't have much under them, inspection is by helicopter, and the lines cannot be shut down. I would not be surprised if "fix it when it breaks" is a nationwide phenomenon for high tension lines. What makes it bad is how fire-prone California is. I'm of the opinion that humans should not be living in areas that burn regularly. And in PG&E's def…

> and the lines cannot be shut down. Of course they can. A failure is an unplanned shutdown, and I doubt that leads to better outcomes than a planned shutdown. Also this thread demonstrates that PG&E replaced _other_ parts of the same tower. > I'm of the opinion that humans should not be living in areas that burn regularly. I'm of the opinion that climate change makes this a moving target, and this is simply one of t…

>Of course they can. A failure is an unplanned shutdown

A pedantically accurate retort, but ignores the real point.

Shutting down these lines for "inspection" is not feasible. These lines are the backbone of a grid that millions of people and services rely on 24/7/365, and there is zero redundancy. They are responsible for delivering power to hospitals, traffic lights, schools, airports, grocery stores, homes, businesses, and the list goes on.

Telling people "We need to turn off your power for a couple days every couple months for inspections" is going to create a lot of backlash, no matter how good the reason.

Also, the lines in question aren't like closing a two lane road in a small neighborhood for a couple hours where a few annoyed people can take alternate routes. It's more like shutting down all the freeways in a major city for a day just so that the DOT can finally get some street sweeping done. Good luck not starting a riot.

The problem is, these systems are old, too many people rely on them, and there is no redundancy.

If we want to take a step towards fixing the problem, the best start is to create redundancy for power supply to consumers, imo. Preferably more localized power generation via wind/solar/etc with some localized power storage.

Also, their profit margin for one year is not a fair argument towards them being at fault. Economics of public companies are about a lot more than "We made extra money, so we should have just spent it on making our product better". If shareholders don't make money in a company, they pull their investments. You pull enough investments in PG&E, that means they have to cut costs. Meaning, less money for inspections and improvements to the grid.

Economics at scale is not a black-and-white, napkin math, solvable problem.

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