-
Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
Oct 2019 electric utility power shutdowns in various parts of California
- Thread starter sceptic
- Start date
-
- Tags
- Tesla Inc.
According the "charge your car" message from Tesla sent to cars in the area, the database that the nav systems queries will be updated with any down superchargers,
Eno Deb
Active Member
I think it has everything to do with prioritizing saving money over safety. PG&E made solid profits for years (thanks to their monopoly position). And still, they invested very little in the safety of their equipment and power lines in areas with high risk of wildfires (such as moving the lines underground and clearing vegetation). They'd rather pay out huge dividends and CEO salaries. Only after the Paradise disaster did they start to do those things.
Pluto
is a Planet
I was too lazy to download Google Earth, but the kmz files here could shed light on the exact map where power is down. It appears it's updated daily at 7:30am: https://pspsmaps.ss.pge.com/
My objection is with the word "save", as in "to store for future use". The shareholders didn't see that money; the company is going bankrupt. It all went into big bonuses for their executives.
And thanks to the state regulators. The State PUC approves budgets and rate increases, as well as safety plans. Sure, PG&E sux, but it is all approved by the appointees of California Governors.
Newsom needs to step up and make the PUC accept responsibility for their enabling this cluster...
About Us
The PUC is and always has been largely useless. But these days, they seem to be a victim of regulatory capture. (That's a nice way of saying "corruption".)
There is only one way to make public utilities work well, and that is for the government to buy up all the private power companies and spin them off as a government-owned nonprofit. As long as you have a profit motive, and as long as there is no means for the public to kick the leadership of those companies out when they're doing a bad job, things just don't work. The term "regulated monopoly" is a polite fiction, much like "clean coal" or "he didn't suffer in the end." Just saying.
@dgatwood asked if I still had power. So last night 8pm went by and 10pm was suppose to be the next shutdown time but both passed with lights still on. Thought maybe the winds down here weren't materializing and might get lucky; but, bam, lights went out at 10:42p. Had some battery lighting on so at least was prepared in that respect. Went to bed wondering how long it would be and whether the battery on our alarm system and hardwired smoke detectors would die and if I'd end up with 80db chirps telling me to replace the battery. Thankfully didn't have to find out.
Woke up this morning to the sound of my next door neighbor's generator. Part of our town had power (had noticed where from the PG&E map the other day and figure it was on a different transmission line) so called the Starbucks in that area and sure enough they were up and serving coffee. Headed out for breakfast, and then down to Gilroy to pick up a 6v battery for a camping lantern I was using just in case. Got lunch, decided to add a bit more battery at the Gilroy superchargers (location was not even quite half full although driving by earlier had looked busier). Got home around 2:30p today and out of habit turned on the entryway light and the lights went on! No idea exactly when we got power back but sure felt great. Feel bad for all those still in the dark.
BTW one of the great things about our Teslas is that I was able to charge my phone in the car while driving this morning. No need to look for a place to plug in at some other location. Thought it was probably possible to also charge my watch as well although I had left it at home powered off. Well glad to be back to charging at home.
Woke up this morning to the sound of my next door neighbor's generator. Part of our town had power (had noticed where from the PG&E map the other day and figure it was on a different transmission line) so called the Starbucks in that area and sure enough they were up and serving coffee. Headed out for breakfast, and then down to Gilroy to pick up a 6v battery for a camping lantern I was using just in case. Got lunch, decided to add a bit more battery at the Gilroy superchargers (location was not even quite half full although driving by earlier had looked busier). Got home around 2:30p today and out of habit turned on the entryway light and the lights went on! No idea exactly when we got power back but sure felt great. Feel bad for all those still in the dark.
BTW one of the great things about our Teslas is that I was able to charge my phone in the car while driving this morning. No need to look for a place to plug in at some other location. Thought it was probably possible to also charge my watch as well although I had left it at home powered off. Well glad to be back to charging at home.
Last edited:
thecloud
As rhythm raced inside, the ship came alive
I bet there will be a surge in Powerwall sales, but only faraday or so.
FlatSix911
Porsche 918 Hybrid
PG&E is currently too busy shutting off the power, to be bothered by a simple request to maintain their infrastructure...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/northern-california-faces-massive-power-outage-as-pgande-hedges-wildfire-risk/2019/10/09/576facfa-ead9-11e9-9306-47cb0324fd44_story.html
There are no generators for sale here, with all sold out. Plastic gas jugs are in short supply. What there is plenty of, though, is a thin fury directed at one of the nation’s largest utilities after it shut down power to more than half a million customers Wednesday, with further blackouts planned in the hours ahead.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/northern-california-faces-massive-power-outage-as-pgande-hedges-wildfire-risk/2019/10/09/576facfa-ead9-11e9-9306-47cb0324fd44_story.html
There are no generators for sale here, with all sold out. Plastic gas jugs are in short supply. What there is plenty of, though, is a thin fury directed at one of the nation’s largest utilities after it shut down power to more than half a million customers Wednesday, with further blackouts planned in the hours ahead.
Ulmo
Active Member
- Our power never went out. Irony given that I had my PowerWalls and solar all ready for it, charged everything up, filled everything, washed everything, etc. We never lost Internet, water, or anything else. I guess that was the point: the water tanks are in my neighborhood.
- Almost everyone else's power did go out.
- This web site is very informative: National Weather Service and National Weather Service which focus on dry hot windy spots. One of the knowledgeable hams told me PG&E's using a professional version of Windy.Com. Analysis shows they paid attention to specialized Orange County firefighters that told them where the fire risks were; our area has coastal redwoods with morning dew all but 5 to 10 days a year, so we aren't at risk ever, despite what the scared people think whenever they see a tree. 100% tree canopy cover keeps the foliage below green and not very burnable. The Eucalyptus weeds from Australia are oily death traps that are super dangerous and need to be eliminated, so all those areas were shut down. Urban areas that chop down too many trees let through too much sunlight and the underbrush turns to tinder and those areas are dangerous as hell and those got shut down, too. So, keep your coastal redwood forests intact, is the lesson! Water those lawns and keep that humidity up! Don't listen to the screaming rabble rousers; they're almost always wrong. And the PG&E tendency to chop down coastal redwood trees and branches is just plain wrong in my opinion. Up in the dry hot air oily dead tree Sierra Nevadas and Santa Rosa areas, they should have listened to Bill Wattenburg and maintained the forests properly; smart old men knew what to do, but the politicians wanted to kill us all. Screw them.
- There was only one ham out of a dozen I knew from last night's network that didn't have backup power for their home in one way or another (12V battery, gas, propane, generator, one with solar), and only 3 that didn't have their PG&E shut off. Those tend to be mountain folk who have been through this dozens of times and have tribal knowledge about how to deal with it. I actually was one of the least-power-prepared, since I didn't have a 12V battery for my ham radio. I need to step up my game, being a sloth slumming it with only some PowerWalls and solar, even though it didn't matter since I never saw a lick of flicker in the utility electrical.
- I totally recommend everyone get PowerWalls, once Tesla releases a 500kWh home version that is 2020NPFA855 compliant and brings the price of that down to about $40,000 and actually starts installing them within 2 days of you paying a deposit. Or something closer to that, anyway. As it is, getting 4 PowerWalls like most homes need today now requires a 10 foot by 40 foot fenced in area in your yard that looks like a gross urban utility ghetto, costs about $40,000 for under 11% of the capacity of the above half-MWh pack idea, and takes forever on a waiting list that will never end. Building your own was legal up until now, and now the government won't let you, because if you do, it would solve all the energy and fire problems of the State, and the government definitely doesn't want that (they want political power, not solutions). (What they don't know can't hurt them, but can hurt you, if you aren't careful, and accidentally tell someone, which of course is part of why you're doing it.)
Last edited:
Ulmo
Active Member
Yup!
For some reason, my problems have settled down to only affecting the stove in the kitchen which requires a reset button, and one other item that must be unimportant since I don't remember it now -- it may or may not have been some network component. My server uptime right now: "09:28:10 up 408 days, 3:56, 5 users, load average: 0.41, 0.40, 0.37"; the only reason I shut it down was to upgrade it and to test the PowerWalls way back when.
But since my utility never went off, I didn't even experience that hiccup.
I already posted my discovery about why they chose some neighborhoods over others and at what time in the post above.
Ulmo
Active Member
It's been through every roof ever since it was announced. That's never been the problem. Tesla is refusing to install them. They should have done what they said they were going to do in the conference calls and put 50% of the battery capacity into PowerWalls. Of course they lied and then changed their mind and admitted to that years later, probably intentionally to dry up the competition. Well, it worked: now we have no competition to Tesla and there are no companies selling home electric storage solutions of any worth, besides a twice as bad option called LG.
11thIndian
Member
So according to the great links provided above, Vacaville, Sacramento, and Roseville are all ok, but Rocklin and Fairfield will be down.
Most importantly, Truckee is unaffected.
Thanks!
Most importantly, Truckee is unaffected.
Thanks!
ReddykwRun
Member
Oh my, the joys of living the california dream........ Not. Usually, I would say here "would the last person leaving please turn the lights off" but that's already been taken care of.
Last edited:
ReddykwRun
Member
Please correct me if I am wrong but don't you still need grid power to be able to utilize the Power Wall?
Bruce, what are charging your neighbors to charge their phones?
BTW, a "true-sine" backup battery will keep your home network up. I have unit from CyberPower that works well. $120 or so.
I have had no issues in 4 power outages with our network remaining up.
The PowerWalls have worked quite well for us.
BrokerDon
Active Member
Our "backup generator" has:
- 327W solar
- 232Ah 12V DC deep cycle "golf cart" batteries
- 3.2kW Onan QuietDiesel generator with 25 gallon fuel tank (.3 gallons / hour @ ½ load and .4 gallons / hour @ full load)
- dual thermostatically controlled ceiling vent fans
- 15,000 BTU AC
- 13,500 BTU LP heater
- 32" 12V DC HDTV
- 8+ USB outlets
- USB-C laptop power supply that runs off 12V DC
- shaded patio with wind sensor to auto retract
- sleeping for 6
- LP refrigerator / freezer that will run for weeks off large LP tank
- LP range
- microwave
- bathroom
- shower
- kitchen sink
- ability to relocate in < 5 minutes
No. You could have it connected to a residential solar system which would charge it during the day while the grid is down and the Powerwall would then supply power while the sun is down.
Similar threads
