Materials to get lights on are getting scarce • Hacker News Board

Re: Materials to get lights on are getting scarce

#31

Post by S_A_P » Mon, Sep 06, 2021, 1:30 PM UTC

I think it’s been well known that an attack on the US electric grid that damaged substations was a big risk as the large transformers have a long lead time and there is only a limited number of spares available.

I also don’t expect a 24 year old payment processor for a utility company to have perfect access to information about the operations and capex side of the business so take with appropriate salt grains.

Bottom line is yes we should worry about securing the national infrastructure but not because of this Reddit post.

Re: Materials to get lights on are getting scarce

#32

Post by test6554 » Mon, Sep 06, 2021, 3:33 PM UTC

scottLobster wrote: post #9

toomuchtodo wrote: post #2

Not a terrible thing to have happen. From a consumer perspective, it’ll be another factor for those who choose to buy rooftop solar and batteries. From a nation state perspective, it’s signal to ramp domestic manufacturing capacity for critical infra. 80 week lead times for high end transformers isn’t a terrible deviation from the norm (usually a year), but with the electrification of everything, it’s no longer accep…

You say buy rooftop solar and batteries like it's an option most people have. Depending on who's numbers you go by most American households would be bankrupted by a multi-thousand dollar emergency, they don't have the disposable income for solar and batteries. That's without even considering legalities regarding grid connection (some utilities don't allow independent operation of solar panels that are also connected…

Good ideas don’t become bad ideas simply because the poor can’t afford it. If 10% or 20% of the country had independent sources of electricity, that would still be much better for our civilization than 0%

Re: Materials to get lights on are getting scarce

#33

Post by irrational » Mon, Sep 06, 2021, 4:37 PM UTC

1shooner wrote: post #27

irrational wrote: post #16

Recently I installed a fan in my living room. While I was at it I expanded the gang box from 3 to 4 and decided to replace the toggle switches with rocker switches. I was shocked when I went to the electrical aisle of my local Home Depot. They were out of so many components. I ended up having to go to 3 different Home Depots, 2 different Lowes, and 1 Ace Hardware to find all the parts I was looking for. I asked vario…

I think your experience may have more to do with looking in brick and mortar locations that have probably permanently lost foot traffic in the last year. It looks like (in the US) there are plenty of rocker-style switches on Amazon available for delivery in 1 or 2 days, or homedepot.com in 4 or 5 days. The last time I was in a big box hardware store, it looked like they had kind of given up on front-of-house organiza…

Have they lost foot traffic? Every time I’ve been there, it has been crowded.

Re: Materials to get lights on are getting scarce

#34

Post by FiggyPudding » Tue, Sep 07, 2021, 3:38 PM UTC

1shooner wrote: post #27

irrational wrote: post #16

Recently I installed a fan in my living room. While I was at it I expanded the gang box from 3 to 4 and decided to replace the toggle switches with rocker switches. I was shocked when I went to the electrical aisle of my local Home Depot. They were out of so many components. I ended up having to go to 3 different Home Depots, 2 different Lowes, and 1 Ace Hardware to find all the parts I was looking for. I asked vario…

I think your experience may have more to do with looking in brick and mortar locations that have probably permanently lost foot traffic in the last year. It looks like (in the US) there are plenty of rocker-style switches on Amazon available for delivery in 1 or 2 days, or homedepot.com in 4 or 5 days. The last time I was in a big box hardware store, it looked like they had kind of given up on front-of-house organiza…

That's probably very regional considering the different reactions to COVID everywhere