- Joined
- Sep 26, 2018
- Messages
- 5,008
- SL Rez
- 2002
At the moment it's a really bad time to be in Texas. Due to the onset of winter, which was never experienced before, the whole state is utterly unprepared for what's happening right now. What we're witnessing at the moment is a chain of self-energising effects, which ultimately leads to the total failure of big parts of its infrastructure.
To keep the power grid somewhat running electricity suppliers in Texas are now practicing rotating blackouts. 1/4 of all households in Texas are without electrical power at the moment.
Since suddenly a lot of Texans want to heat their homes the demand on electricity, the spot demand will increase dramatically up to the point that outages in all of Texas will become reality.
Tap water is frozen in many communities. Using streets is almost impossible, because the cities are unprepared for a winter of this measure and simply don't have the necessary tools at hand to clear the streets of snow.
The reason for this atypical winter is climate change. It's quite sure that this will be just the first winter in a loose chain of such events.
Water treatment plants fail due to power outages.
Meanwhile electrical power becomes a luxury good, the invisible hand of the market its doing its thing and for electricity suppliers one kWh costs now 9 US$ on the spot market.
Due Texas having their own power grid they cannot get electrical power from somewhere else.
In big cities light now clearly illuminates where the rich are living, like in Austin, Houston or Dallas:
In the whole town of Dallas there's only one warming center for homeless or other people who need some warmth.
The mobile phone grid is failing, because there's no electrical power and the emergency backup generators are frozen. Also first deaths by carbon monoxide poisoning.
The Houston Chronicle was unable to print its Tuesday issue due to power outage. This didn't even happen in 2017 during Hurricane Harvey.
Cities like Abilene are shutting down their water treatment and service due to the power outages.
34 GW on power capacity are missing; the national guard should help.
Also gas and oil pipelines are frozen. The missing electrical power produced by wind turbines is roughly 10 GW, the rest is almost entirely fossil.
Meanwhile in Austin some hotels still have power, so if you want to stay in a nice and warm room, for 1000 bucks only you can rent it. Hotels in most cities are booked out at the moment.
Big parts of Houston have a 20h lasting power outage, and its mayor is really pissed:
The problem why the outage happened? Because instruments at the fossile power plants are currently frozen, and cannot be heated! "Blaming reduced wind output is really a red herring!"
A word of warning makes the round: the number of people suffering carbon monoxide poisoning is increasing at an alarming rate, because many people bring outdoor appliances (grills etc.) inside, or run their car inside a garage.
Tap water stored in bath tubs to have a small local supply to overcome possible outages might become ice.
Also a side note: this winter event is disrupting COVID19 vaccinations.
It's so cold, that fire departments are unable to battle house fires because water treatments are offline and there's too low water pressure, in case the pipe is not frozen already.
Due to the cold temperatures a lot of water pipes cannot withstand the pressure any longer and are breaking. In Austin the fire department gets about one such call per minute, and can only respond to a fraction of it, meaning are unable to fix them all on time.
The power outages also affect farmers, dairy operations are really hard to do right now, which is bad for the cows.
Winter storm in Texas: At least 10 deaths linked to statewide disaster; Austin outages may last another day or more
People in Harris County were told to cook water and store it for later usage, if possible.
If things go well, the needed electrical power will be available Thursday:
By the way when the gas pipelines started to freeze it's quite probably that some power plants were turned off on purpose for profit. The reason why? The electrical power companies are mostly buying gas without price fixing, but sell them to their customers with fixed rates. When the gas price became too high to make profit turning off looks nicely to their owners.
Also the authorities authorized now the electrical power suppliers to charge the spot market prices to their customers. Millions of Texans will get a hefty power bill for this event.
To keep the power grid somewhat running electricity suppliers in Texas are now practicing rotating blackouts. 1/4 of all households in Texas are without electrical power at the moment.
Since suddenly a lot of Texans want to heat their homes the demand on electricity, the spot demand will increase dramatically up to the point that outages in all of Texas will become reality.
Tap water is frozen in many communities. Using streets is almost impossible, because the cities are unprepared for a winter of this measure and simply don't have the necessary tools at hand to clear the streets of snow.
The reason for this atypical winter is climate change. It's quite sure that this will be just the first winter in a loose chain of such events.
Water treatment plants fail due to power outages.
Meanwhile electrical power becomes a luxury good, the invisible hand of the market its doing its thing and for electricity suppliers one kWh costs now 9 US$ on the spot market.
Due Texas having their own power grid they cannot get electrical power from somewhere else.
In big cities light now clearly illuminates where the rich are living, like in Austin, Houston or Dallas:
In the whole town of Dallas there's only one warming center for homeless or other people who need some warmth.
The mobile phone grid is failing, because there's no electrical power and the emergency backup generators are frozen. Also first deaths by carbon monoxide poisoning.
The Houston Chronicle was unable to print its Tuesday issue due to power outage. This didn't even happen in 2017 during Hurricane Harvey.
Cities like Abilene are shutting down their water treatment and service due to the power outages.
34 GW on power capacity are missing; the national guard should help.
Also gas and oil pipelines are frozen. The missing electrical power produced by wind turbines is roughly 10 GW, the rest is almost entirely fossil.
Meanwhile in Austin some hotels still have power, so if you want to stay in a nice and warm room, for 1000 bucks only you can rent it. Hotels in most cities are booked out at the moment.
Big parts of Houston have a 20h lasting power outage, and its mayor is really pissed:
The problem why the outage happened? Because instruments at the fossile power plants are currently frozen, and cannot be heated! "Blaming reduced wind output is really a red herring!"
A word of warning makes the round: the number of people suffering carbon monoxide poisoning is increasing at an alarming rate, because many people bring outdoor appliances (grills etc.) inside, or run their car inside a garage.
Tap water stored in bath tubs to have a small local supply to overcome possible outages might become ice.
Also a side note: this winter event is disrupting COVID19 vaccinations.
It's so cold, that fire departments are unable to battle house fires because water treatments are offline and there's too low water pressure, in case the pipe is not frozen already.
Due to the cold temperatures a lot of water pipes cannot withstand the pressure any longer and are breaking. In Austin the fire department gets about one such call per minute, and can only respond to a fraction of it, meaning are unable to fix them all on time.
The power outages also affect farmers, dairy operations are really hard to do right now, which is bad for the cows.
Winter storm in Texas: At least 10 deaths linked to statewide disaster; Austin outages may last another day or more
People in Harris County were told to cook water and store it for later usage, if possible.
If things go well, the needed electrical power will be available Thursday:
By the way when the gas pipelines started to freeze it's quite probably that some power plants were turned off on purpose for profit. The reason why? The electrical power companies are mostly buying gas without price fixing, but sell them to their customers with fixed rates. When the gas price became too high to make profit turning off looks nicely to their owners.
Also the authorities authorized now the electrical power suppliers to charge the spot market prices to their customers. Millions of Texans will get a hefty power bill for this event.
