Loss of wind causes Texas power grid emergency

Reuters ^ | 2/28/08 | Mikey_1962

[Mikey_1962]

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A drop in wind generation late on Tuesday, coupled with colder weather, triggered an electric emergency that caused the Texas grid operator to cut service to some large customers, the grid agency said on Wednesday.

Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) said a decline in wind energy production in west Texas occurred at the same time evening electric demand was building as colder temperatures moved into the state.

The grid operator went directly to the second stage of an emergency plan at 6:41 PM CST (0041 GMT), ERCOT said in a statement.

System operators curtailed power to interruptible customers to shave 1,100 megawatts of demand within 10 minutes, ERCOT said. Interruptible customers are generally large industrial customers who are paid to reduce power use when emergencies occur.

No other customers lost power during the emergency, ERCOT said. Interruptible customers were restored in about 90 minutes and the emergency was over in three hours.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

And you need reliable monitoring of the uphill lake, as we observed in the Taum Sauk reservoir disaster.

[The Duke]

I’ve walked many such rows with hoe in hand. That was a lifetime ago, though. :)

[aumrl]

I DON’T BELIEVE THERE WAS ANY ACCIDENT AT A NUCLEAR FACILITY!

[thackney]

Pump storage is used is some place. It is one of the most economical energy storage methods of significant power (small city sized power).

However, that much power usually looks something like the examples below.

Okinawa Seawater Pumped Storage Power Plant

Tianhuangping pumped storage hydroelectric project

Mt. Elbert Pumped Storage Powerplant

Seneca Pumped Storage Generating Station

[CharlesWayneCT]

You are right, it was a substation problem that led to the shutdown of the facility.

[OCCASparky]

even Comanche Peek only pumps out 20-30% of it capability.

Uh, no. Nuke plants are considered "baseline" load so they're running 100 percent between refueling outages. (Trust me, I work in a nuke plant.) Wind and other "alternative" sources are in addition and do not form the backbone of supply.

Nuke plants aren't even profitable unless they're runnig at least 80-85% power.

Try looking at the CAL-ISO website and see how availability changes, not just demand.

[OCCASparky]

On the other hand, half of florida went black for a while a couple of nights ago because of an incident at a nuclear facility.

Been listening to the MSM again, eh? The AP THINKS it was Turkey Point, but the evidence (thus far) is pointing to a substation fault (namely, a reactor created a 3-phase fault) which caused a transformer (a big one) to blow, and the resulting grid surge is what caused not only the two nuke plants, but the three conventional ones at Turkey Point to trip.

IOW, the AP is talking out their ass. The root cause team likely hasn't even been formed yet. They're probably still gathering data from the ISO and various stations and the cause won't likely be pinned down for several WEEKS, at least.

[TexasGunLover]

There are several power plants that are hydro and oil based that sit in very low usage and even Comanche Peek only pumps out 20-30% of it capability.

That's absolutely correct. There are many natural gas plants TXU runs only a few days of the year, at peak demand.

Nuclear power is where our future lies, and why we're not turning them out left and right, I'll never understand.

[BigSkyDream]

My fear is the “Global Slowing” caused by these wind farms.

Think about it, a fast wind is needed to turn the blades and then you have slow wind exiting the blades.

If we slow the wind down to make electricity then the Earth will stop rotating fast enough to keep spinning in orbit!

We are Doomed! DOOMED!

</ sarcasm off>

[chimera]

Siting a pumped storage facility can be a real challenge since they are large and flood a considerable area. You'd have intervenors out the wazoo lining up to oppose such things in anywhere other than the most desolate of places, and maybe even those, too.

Not a lot of people know it, but the genesis of the modern so-called "environmentalist movement" can be traced to opposition to a power facility known as Storm King Mountain, in the Hudson River Valley. The "environmentalists" were not the greasy, dirty, pony-tailed hippie types you see today, but actually very wealthy landowners who had land with picturesque views of the Hudson Valley north of NYC. They opposed Storm Kind Mountain on the basis of "visual pollution", that is, transmission lines that would be strung across the valley from the generators to substations for downstate transmission, which would "ruin the view". Now, Storm King Mountain was not to be a coal-fired facility or a nuclear plant, but, tah dah, a pumped storage reservoir.

It is ironic because if you ask anyone today in New York state what Storm King Mountain was, almost all of them, including high-ranking political figures, will say it was a nuclear plant. Little do they realize that the opposition was mounted against that darling of "renewable" energy storage, a pumped storage reservoir. Then again, idiots abound in political circles and the general electorate, and the premise of democracy today seems to be that two idiots are smarter than one genius.

[thackney]

Comanche Peek only pumps out 20-30% of it capability.

The capacity factor (percentage of generation compared to capability) from 2004 to 2006 is as follows:

Comanche Peak, Unit 2 - 95.41% Comanche Peak, Unit 1 - 94.33% U.S. capacity factors: A small gain to an already large number
http://www.ans.org/pubs/magazines/nn/docs/2007-5-3.pdf
TABLE I, 2004–2006 DER NET CAPACITY FACTORS OF INDIVIDUAL REACTORS

[thackney]

Comanche Peek only pumps out 20-30% of it capability.

The capacity factor (percentage of generation compared to capability) from 2004 to 2006 is as follows:

Comanche Peak, Unit 2 - 95.41%
Comanche Peak, Unit 1 - 94.33%

U.S. capacity factors: A small gain to an already large number
http://www.ans.org/pubs/magazines/nn/docs/2007-5-3.pdf
TABLE I, 2004–2006 DER NET CAPACITY FACTORS OF INDIVIDUAL REACTORS

[neb52]

Thanks evidently I was wrong. I can always count on you guys to correct me these type of things.