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The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

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Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#51

Post by callalex »

wcoenen wrote: post #14

Summary: utilities will use dynamic rating and other tricks to squeeze a bit more performance out of existing lines. (Transmission lines have losses, these heat up the wires. If they get too hot, they droop too much. So they have a maximum power rating. Dynamic rating takes weather effects into account to vary that maximum.) Meanwhile in China: thousands of km long megavolt UHVDC transmission lines. https://www.hitac…

People were saying the same things about their high speed rail network ten years ago, and now it is in an existential crisis and desperately hemorrhaging money. I am definitely not saying the same will happen for the HVDC projects as I am not clairvoyant or qualified enough to make any claims, I am just pointing out that grand infrastructure investment and central planning almost always looks ingenious in the short term, but that isn’t always sustainable because predicting the future is really hard.

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#52

Post by JumpCrisscross »

janalsncm wrote: post #50
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> has been working for them so far It works in the wake of a decimated economy. War. Natural disaster. Cultural revolution. There is so much slack in the system virtually anything will be put to productive use. In that state, you can build a road to nowhere and people will put it to use , not because it’s a well-placed road, but because it’s the only road in the vicinity.

China’s is not a decimated economy and they haven’t been in cultural revolution for decades. Their government functions much more like a corporation than the popularity contest that will likely give a reality TV star his second term.

> China’s is not a decimated economy and they haven’t been in cultural revolution for decades

Correct. I’m describing the era of anything-goes growth. Because, without exaggeration, anything went.

America saw this in its Manifest Destiny era. (Suppose I should add depopulating conquest to the list.) Switching gears was existentially painful.

> government functions much more like a corporation

This was the pre-Xi CCP. A genuinely-effective meritocratic oligopoly. Now it’s a bog-standard dictatorship, with Chinese characteristics.

Also, good analogy. Corporations are mortal. States, theoretically, are not. The problem with dictatorship is it trades immortality for temporary stability. The deal with the devil is in the difficulty of swapping back.

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#53

Post by callalex »

mnw21cam wrote: post #26
wcoenen wrote: post #14

Summary: utilities will use dynamic rating and other tricks to squeeze a bit more performance out of existing lines. (Transmission lines have losses, these heat up the wires. If they get too hot, they droop too much. So they have a maximum power rating. Dynamic rating takes weather effects into account to vary that maximum.) Meanwhile in China: thousands of km long megavolt UHVDC transmission lines. https://www.hitac…

So basically, next time there's a heatwave and everyone cranks up their aircon, the system will still collapse.

(Warning this is a tangent). Cooling/air conditioning actually uses a relatively small amount of energy compared to heating. As we transition away from fossil fuels for heating over to electricity the real existential crisis will happen in cold periods.

This can be understood intuitively: air conditioning is used when it’s 85° outside to make it 70° inside. Heating is regularly used to make it 65° inside when it is 20° outside. It turns out fossil fuels contain a truly remarkable amount of energy that happens to be really easy to release into a living space.

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#54

Post by callalex »

tedunangst wrote: post #3

> When the wind blows, for example, power lines are cooler, allowing for more capacity. Okay, but what do you do when the wind isn't blowing? How do you get people to only charge their cars when it's windy?

I don’t understand how your quote and question are related, can you connect the dots for me?

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#56

Post by JasserInicide »

alberth wrote: post #41

Not just power grid … US infrastructure overall is in need of a “jolt” (updating). Bridges, highways, power grid and more are all aging and in need of massive updating / refresh.

I have 0 faith in our governments to carry out any long-term projects that aren't military-related. Like wasn't a trillion dollar infrastructure bill passed a couple years ago? Where has all that money gone?

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#57

Post by rconti »

It looks like during last year's heat wave, California FINALLY broke its previous all-time peak load of 50,270mW in 24 July 2006, with a whopping 52,061mW on 6 September 2023.

Still, peak usage year over year looks flat to my eyes.

I'm sure we can't keep time-shifting and efficiency engineering ourselves out of a fundamental need for more total energy for a huge % of EVs and the push to phase out natural gas, but it might do most of the work for us. All big power hogs are getting more efficient. Electric cars can charge "whenever", but I imagine a future where just spreading the EV load between 11pm and 6am is no longer enough. Plus, we need more energy storage or non-solar) sources to handle the fact that loads are going to increasingly move to the overnight hours.

https://www.caiso.com/documents/californiaisopeakloadhistory...

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#58

Post by travisb »

callalex wrote: post #54
tedunangst wrote: post #3

> When the wind blows, for example, power lines are cooler, allowing for more capacity. Okay, but what do you do when the wind isn't blowing? How do you get people to only charge their cars when it's windy?

I don’t understand how your quote and question are related, can you connect the dots for me?

The quote is saying that transmission line capacity is higher when it's windy and lower when it is windless (due to less cooling).

If you assume that EV charging is the marginal load which would put you over the windless capacity, but not the windy capacity, then in order to prevent overload you'd need to prevent EV charging when there is no wind and therefore the transmission capacity is lower.

Taking a step back it's a general problem with this type of optimization, what to do when the system has become accustomed to, and is designed for, capacity which isn't available. How do you get people to use less power in order to avoid a blackout?

Re: The aging U.S. power grid is about to get a jolt

#59

Post by ckdarby »

hi-v-rocknroll wrote: post #23

EDIT: Where I live, there is mostly 69 kV and 138 kV, with only a few 345 kV lines. There aren't nearly enough 500 kV lines, and 765 kV aren't present in the region. EDIT2: Here's what a 765 kV line looks like: https://maps.app.goo.gl/3fV1hFuQmpq3hVNx5 Map of US electric grid: https://www.arcgis.com/apps/mapviewer/index.html?layers=d409... Real wiring is dominated by current, resistance of the conductor, and cooling.…

Was surprised only to see one 765 line run into Quebec
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