Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indoors??
Yes, there were sub zero temperatures in Dallas last night.
How badly are your homes insulated that you get internal=external temperature in mere hours???
What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
811–820 of 1001 posts
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#812Earlier quoted context omitted.
Electricity is unlimited and cheap when people do not fear to build nuclear power plants. > Maybe electricity should be sold in blocks that have to be refilled, set daily/monthly quotas or limit current draw Or maybe there should be realtime electricity price and fines for outages, so both providers and consumers would be incentivised to optimize consumption, and market will make the electricity available.
Nuclear power is nearly the most expensive source of power if you include the cost of decommissioning and liability insurance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source#...
Yes, but no. Nuclear power plants are extremely costly because they lack prefabrication-level standardization. This is the main cost driver. And this is simply because there's no economies of scale. Because we're not building enough. Classic vicious cycle. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#813Earlier quoted context omitted.
Houston right now, haven't had power, nor water since yesterday. My room is sitting at 20ish degrees and has been all day. I've quite literally been snug under a load of blankets with my wife all day just to stay warm. My office back in Dallas which is not normally open offered to let people stay the night since they happen to be on the same grid as a hospital and I seriously considered trying to make it there today
dude, go to the office. Its too cold to sleep in those conditions.
> Its too cold to sleep in those conditions.
I don't understand - how do you think people camp in cold parts of the world? Of course you can sleep in those conditions.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#814Earlier quoted context omitted.
Houston right now, haven't had power, nor water since yesterday. My room is sitting at 20ish degrees and has been all day. I've quite literally been snug under a load of blankets with my wife all day just to stay warm. My office back in Dallas which is not normally open offered to let people stay the night since they happen to be on the same grid as a hospital and I seriously considered trying to make it there today
What? That’s way below freezing and totally unsafe. Why don’t you sleep in your car? (WARNING: Make sure your exhaust is uncovered and you’re not in your shed)
> What? That’s way below freezing and totally unsafe.
How do you think people safely camp in cold climates? You can sleep safely at far far below zero in a sleeping bag.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#815At $9000 per MWh ($9 per KWh), you could connect your exercise bike to the grid and make nearly minimum wage if you're fit.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#816Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or you know, instead of having a whole fireplace, just get a kerosene heater? Enough to heat a whole room in case of power&gas outages, last long enough through the night on one fill, and kerosene can be had at a gas station.
I am not sure why you got downvoted, this is a good backup strategy. I have natural gas heating and a combi smart boiler which runs on electricity. Even if I still have the gas link operational, if my power goes down then my heating is dead. This news of Texas actually reminded, that I should have some sort of emergency winter heating backup, and a boat or camping kerosene heater is a actually a pretty solid idea for…
The whole prepper community isn't completely crazy. Everyone really should have a Bug Out Bag or a Bug In Bag ready or at least under construction.
You don't need to go overboard with tons of dried food and a nuclear fallout shelter. Just a cheap multi-fuel camping stove and some canned food will last you a few days easily.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#817At $9000 per MWh ($9 per KWh), you could connect your exercise bike to the grid and make nearly minimum wage if you're fit.
I'm reasonably fit with an FTP of about ~280W (4.0W/kg), so I could easily hold 200W for hours. So 5 hours to make $9 I guess?
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#818Earlier quoted context omitted.
While you (and siblings) are all correct, I don't get the down voting of the poor guy trying to make a joke while being considerate-ish and hoping that you guys were actually warmer than you were. That said, I've been out in the hammock in 0F here, including snow and wind chill on top and been warm (oh wait, I'll be down voted too). It's all about insulation, which actually helps in both warm and cold weather. You ca…
Making jokes is for Reddit, not HN
The more time I spend on Hacker News, the more it just seems like Reddit to me. All the worst impulses are still here. The dog-piling, the comments that were made without opening the article, the low-effort jokes. At least there's no pun threads.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#819Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anecdote: All 7 developers in my Houston team (semi-geographically scattered in the city) lost power; half for >24 hrs (it's 10-25 degrees F here for the last 2-3 days). Most lost water for some stretch of time and some still don't have it. I don't think any completely lost heat (most have gas) but at least one person found their gas fireplace they were hoping would heat them up when out of power didn't really work t…
I have seen some fireplaces in US (I am from Poland) and outside of northern states they are all decorative pieces not designed to heat the home. A good fireplace is completely closed (yes! no fire visible!) and is built to recover and store as much heat as possible. * the fireplace must be enclosed completely so that it is possible to regulate amount of air going inside and especially to close it completely and SAFE…
There is a difference between a fireplace and a wood-fueled heater. You have described the latter. No one would ever call what you have shown in those images a 'fireplace' in English. There are wood-fueled heaters but they have mostly been replaced by ones that use composite wood pellets, these are popular for off-grid heating in the US.
Re: What went wrong with the Texas power grid?
#820Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good luck, and here's some advice from a midwesterner that has dealt with cold, ice, and snow forever. If it's cold enough to start freezing things inside then make sure you have some water flowing in your pipes. Keep your kitchen sink running on a low (very tiny) dribble. Maybe even keep a shower/bathrub running at a very low rate too. You do NOT want to be dealing with frozen, broken flooding pipes on top of no pow…
There is what people that have vacation homes do in the winter, shut off the water and drain the water heater and pipes.
... and put a non-toxic antifreeze in the water traps (and seal the drains up) to prevent sewer gas from entering the house.