California Power Outages

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Originally Posted by bdcardinal
Originally Posted by xfactor9
The real issue is that a segment of the population wants to live in rural, rustic areas of the state and but aren't willing to pay for the infrastructure to support their desired life. Calif has mountainous & hilly terrain and huge expanses of forests. It is expensive to build a robust power grid in that type of terrain. And since those areas are sparely populated, the per-capita cost is enormous. The residents of those areas want to enjoy Calif's scenery but aren't willing or able to pay all of the costs to safely live in it. The state has 80,000 miles of overhead power lines; thousands of miles would need to be buried. Is the relatively small population of rural residents willing to fork over tens of billions to do that? I doubt it. The urban areas aren't affected and don't want to subsidize their lifestyle choice.

And not all those rural areas are rich people -- Paradise, the city that burned down, was relatively poor. In fact, rural areas of the state are on average poorer than the urban areas. Wealthy residents will pay $10k for a standby generator, so this won't affect them in the future. The others will have to make a choice.



This is so true. People want to live in the middle of no where but have all the amenities like they are living in suburbia. If I was going to buy a house like that I would have solar panels along with battery storage and generators.


The problem in California isn't the mountain dwellers, it's all the flatlanders living in their rat infested cities that make all the rules.
California public forests have not been properly maintained for decades. Private landowners are not allowed to cut their own trees or remove vegetation in many locations. As long as the terrible fires can be blamed upon climate change (without any supporting scientific data) and further an agenda don't expect anything to change.
 
Originally Posted by xfactor9
The real issue is that a segment of the population wants to live in rural, rustic areas of the state and but aren't willing to pay for the infrastructure to support their desired life. Calif has mountainous & hilly terrain and huge expanses of forests. It is expensive to build a robust power grid in that type of terrain. And since those areas are sparely populated, the per-capita cost is enormous. The residents of those areas want to enjoy Calif's scenery but aren't willing or able to pay all of the costs to safely live in it. The state has 80,000 miles of overhead power lines; thousands of miles would need to be buried. Is the relatively small population of rural residents willing to fork over tens of billions to do that? I doubt it. The urban areas aren't affected and don't want to subsidize their lifestyle choice.

And not all those rural areas are rich people -- Paradise, the city that burned down, was relatively poor. In fact, rural areas of the state are on average poorer than the urban areas. Wealthy residents will pay $10k for a standby generator, so this won't affect them in the future. The others will have to make a choice.



California in rural vs urban is no different than any other state and yet other states make it work. I suggest California find a way to make it work like every other state.
 
PGE sez the blackout is over. But not all the power has been restored; PGE has to inspect lines and can only be done during daylight.
The city of San Jose's early estimate for support (police, shelters, general help) is half a million dollars; sure to grow.

Can you say, "Fiasco?"
 
Originally Posted by loneryder
How are they going to recharge their Teslas????


Same way people who have gas vehicles do. They fill or charge before the event effecting power.

During outages in East only a very few select gas stations (typically truck stops) have a backup generator to power the gas pumps.
 
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Originally Posted by Cujet
Originally Posted by E365
Originally Posted by loneryder
How are they going to recharge their Teslas????


There's a bunch of solar-powered Supercharger stations. That's how most will be in the future.

https://www.engadget.com/2017/06/09/elon-musk-superchargers-solar-battery-power/


They work well at night!


Yes, batteries do work well at night.

It's a solar and battery system, as the article mentions. Solar panels charge battery systems and cars get charged off the local batteries, day and night, off-the-grid.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/873131202663690240?s=21
 
Originally Posted by E365
Yes, batteries do work well at night.

It's a solar and battery system, as the article mentions. Solar panels charge battery systems and cars get charged off the local batteries, day and night, off-the-grid.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/873131202663690240?s=21


See, that's how charletans like musk gain their traction...pie in the sky statements that those without understanding take as gospel.

The tesla big battery in South Australia loses 20% of the energy that goes into it...so the 25% efficient solar panels just dropped to 20%.

[Linked Image]


Take this supercharger station in Ca...2000 square metres of roof...in an area that gets 5.3 average hours of over 1KW insolation per day.

https://www.turbinegenerator.org/solar/california/dublin/

10,600KWh of sun per day.

at 25% efficiency...2,650KWh per day average)...letssay 2,400Kwh,half stored,half used direct (I'm being generous here)...8.5GJ, the same as 715 gallons of gas,

If the car taks 60KWh...that's only enough for40 cars...a single tesla semi would take 40% of it...
 
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