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To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

spectrum.ieee.org

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Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#111

Post by Strom »

photochemsyn wrote: post #44

The headline implies the Baltic states will have an independent electricity grid, but it's just switching dependence from Russia to the EU (for electricity) and the USA (for liquified natural gas imports). Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia would be better off eliminating those dependencies entirely by focusing on expanding their domestic renewable energy production infrastructure.

Estonia doesn't really import any electricity from Russia, it's primarily export. Also these connections in general are for cost and fault tolerance. Estonia has enough domestic power plant capacity (including domestic shale oil mining to fuel it) to cover even peak usage. It's just often cheaper to import from Finland.

There are also a lot of renewable energy projects in progress to replace the shale oil systems, but again - capacity isn't the issue.

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#112

Post by jeffrallen »

jeffrallen wrote: post #87
jacquesm wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, they do. The Wikipedia page photos are some of my favorite photos of power tech. Another thing that made a really strong impression was visiting a power dam and realizing that it was almost dead quiet while an enormous amount of power was being generated. Just a slight hum and a vibration in the floor, that was all.

But if those rotors were even a few grams out of balance, you'd feel it. Also, if something went wrong with the valves, you'd also hear it. Right before you drowned and/or were killed by flying concrete. Moving water does NOT like to stop.

Here's a documentary on one disaster: https://youtu.be/OjMtbkFF3RM

75 deaths. RIP.

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#113

Post by brnt »

sgjohnson wrote: post #108
halper wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologise to pick nits, but if it is not Turkey it is Türkiye. The former is perfectly fine in English.

> if it is not Turkey it is Türkiye. The former is perfectly fine in English. Not according to the Turkish government. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/03/turkey-changes...

Fortunately they are not in charge of English. Not even the English government is. At most they are in charge of their respective versions and advocacy of it.

Alphabets and certainly diacritics are used differently in different languages, so insisting on a certain way of writing can only lead to inconsistent pronunciation.

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#114

Post by brnt »

kzrdude wrote: post #99
PartiallyTyped wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found this article from bloomberg on the event! > Europe’s grid, which is usually connected from Lisbon to Istanbul, split into two as the northwest and southeast regions struggled to keep the same frequency. The problem originated in Croatia and led to the equivalent of 200,000 households losing power across Europe. Supply to industrial sites was cut in France and Italy. > Transmission grids need to stay at a freq…

And the work to speed up Moldova & Ukraine's connection to the sychronous grid, just after Russia invaded in 2021, was impressive too.

At the time, it was said this plan was the immediate reason for the invasion: letting the sync finish would have crossed some measure of western integration for the Kremlins tastes.

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#115

Post by brnt »

TMWNN wrote: post #67
chx wrote: post #31

As an aside, one of the most stunning proofs of how successful the European Union is happened with the grid. On 8 January 2021, the synchronous area of Continental Europe split into two, the system separation resulted in a deficit of power (approx. -6.3 GW) in the North-West Area and a surplus of power (approx. +6.3 GW) in the South-East Area, The reaction speed was something to behold. The event happened at 14:05 CE…

>As an aside, one of the most stunning proofs of how successful the European Union is happened with the grid. On 8 January 2021, the synchronous area of Continental Europe split into two The European grid has nothing to do with the EU. The grid includes non-EU countries like Switzerland and Norway. The UK did not leave the grid after Brexit; its interconnections with Ireland and the continent still exist. The US and…

The US isn't even integrated with itself.

And sure, other countries can integrate too, and in fact do. Nobody said only EU members are allowed to do it. It is however the largest grid on earth, and therefore a technical and political feat.

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#116

Post by thrway63245 »

rbanffy wrote: post #94
chx wrote: post #31

As an aside, one of the most stunning proofs of how successful the European Union is happened with the grid. On 8 January 2021, the synchronous area of Continental Europe split into two, the system separation resulted in a deficit of power (approx. -6.3 GW) in the North-West Area and a surplus of power (approx. +6.3 GW) in the South-East Area, The reaction speed was something to behold. The event happened at 14:05 CE…

The EU itself is a thing to behold. Just managing to prevent wars between their members for so many decades is a remarkable accomplishment, unheard of in the continent's troubled history. Not perfect, and certainly not invulnerable to bad actors, but still a beautiful accomplishment of will and politics.

[dead]

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#117

Post by andylynch »

pcl wrote: post #80
throw0101c wrote: post #48

HVDC facilities look like something out of a scifi movie: * https://new.abb.com/news/detail/19701/abb-wins-600-mw-hvdc-o...

... meanwhile, it's hard to believe that Japan still runs two separate grids at two separate frequencies. Seems like it'd be worth sorting out a transition plan instead of building that sort of facility, and (presumably) a bunch of others just like it.

It’s not worth the eye watering amount of money it would cost to change. It took nearly seventy years to transition users off the much smaller NYC DC grid, which was obsolete in the 1920s!

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#118

Post by rootusrootus »

helloooooooo wrote: post #88
TMWNN wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>As an aside, one of the most stunning proofs of how successful the European Union is happened with the grid. On 8 January 2021, the synchronous area of Continental Europe split into two The European grid has nothing to do with the EU. The grid includes non-EU countries like Switzerland and Norway. The UK did not leave the grid after Brexit; its interconnections with Ireland and the continent still exist. The US and…

US and Canada grids are split east-west, and then there is a third grid restricted entirely to the geographic region of Texas

But all of those are connected via HVDC, so aren't they the same grid? Or are you limiting your definition to synchronous grids?

Re: To free the Baltic grid, old technology is new again

#119

Post by actionfromafar »

brnt wrote: post #114
kzrdude wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the work to speed up Moldova & Ukraine's connection to the sychronous grid, just after Russia invaded in 2021, was impressive too.

At the time, it was said this plan was the immediate reason for the invasion: letting the sync finish would have crossed some measure of western integration for the Kremlins tastes.

The Kremlin is so easily offended.
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