Rolling Blackouts in Texas

[erpowers]

There are rolling blackouts in Texas. Center Point Energy and another company is reporting that due to some generating stations being down demand is now out pacing supply. A few minutes ago a news station in Houston was just hit by the blackouts. The station in now broadcasting due to its backup generator. Center Point Energy is reporting that the blackouts will last no longer than fifteen minutes. Center Point Energy is also asking people to turn their thermostat up to at least 78 degrees and to not open their refrigerators and freezers unless they need to. They are also asking people to not use any of their electronics unless they really need them.

[NYC]

1. Why are the generating stations down?

Did they say?

[babylonsister]

11. It's only April but hit 90+ today; they weren't prepared for everyone,

including us, switching on their a/c today.

[Skittles]

29. 101 at DFW today

yup

[Mugsy]

44. 15% of stations offline for "Seasonal Maintenance".

According to my local NBC station (Channel 2):

As much as 15 percent of the state's power supply goes off-line each spring so plants can perform seasonal maintenance before energy usage peaks in the summer, said Public Utility Commission spokesman Terry Hadley. He said maintenance is typically finished by mid-May.

http://www.click2houston.com/news/8777649/detail.html

Draw your own conclusions. But it's only April, so if they are having problems now, what does August hold for us?

Remember what those Enron traders said about California and the Titanic.

:evilfrown:

[NYC]

51. I remember that they deliberately took stations offline

for maintenance in order to drive up the price.

[saigon68]

70. Makes Sense to the criminals

to maximize their profits

[kestrel91316]

81. I guess they figured it wouldn't work with CA again, so they moved

on to their next victim: TX.

Next stop, FL.

[WhiteTara]

75. we heard a lot about "off line for maintenance"

when they were raping us in California. Good luck to you folks in Texas. It sounds like it is going to be a hell of a summer.

[POAS]

2. LINK??

[Rose Siding]

9. Post 7

and here-

http://cbs11tv.com/topstories/local_story_107182129.html

[Demeter]

3. Uh-huh. Guess We'll Have Blackouts in lieu of Terror Alerts.

It's not even May, (your favorite expletive here).

[Catherine Vincent]

Why else would you open your fridge or freezer unless you need to?

[uppityperson]

8. to make sure that little light still works?

:rofl: for stupid advice.

[Jose Diablo]

24. You know, I try to see if the frig light goes out, but the light is on

no matter how fast I open the door. I try to close the door slowly, peeking around the edge of the door, but it seems to stay lit. Sometimes I cannot sleep, wondering if the light is on inside the closed frig.

[Thor_MN]

32. Easy solution, just open the door faster than the speed of light...

That way, you will be able to see if the light turns on after you open the door or if it is already on. You should be able to sleep like a baby now.

[Catherine Vincent]

40. You guys are such kidders!

Hopefully there aren't some people that do that. :-)

[ChairmanAgnostic]

18. Why do you hate America so much?

I am SORRY. I have to stop with this. But over that holiday Sunday, what was it? some guy coming back to life? well, I had to deal with a few freepers who happen to be family members. They accused me of hating america because I called for impeaching the president.

[SlavesandBulldozers]

58. don't you ever just go to the refrigerator and open the door.

in case something really sweet and chocolatey got put in there by some mysterious being?

[RufusEarl]

4. Just got hit by one of these rolling blackouts, dark for @ 15 min.

[Lady Effingbroke]

27. yup, me too, about 30 minutes ago.

I keep my A/C at about 90 to save $$$. It's gonna be a fun summer. :evilfrown:

[lostnfound]

38. Guess I should be happy..in River Oaks we got hit at 4 pm..

Wonder if it's just good luck that it's before people get home from work but not during the peak heat of the day...Only about 10 minutes, I think.

[arcane1]

5. deja vu all over again

[Ezlivin]

6. This morning's Fort Worth Star-Telegram talked up electric deregulation

as such a wonderful thing! The article lauded the excellent way in which Texas manages its power.

Hmmm.

The irony is sublime.

[Rose Siding]

7. Bet they don't reach Crawford. Here's a link to the CBS affiliate's story

Record Temps Lead To Rolling Blackouts

http://cbs11tv.com/topstories/local_story_107182129.html

[benburch]

14. The President's Ranch likely has a generator set.

He'd never be aware.

[Thor_MN]

35. Do we get all the money that we've spent on the pig farm back?

It loses all it's PR value over the next couple years and I expect that it will be bought by one of Poppie's friend's at an enormous markup sometime in early 2009. I want all the money for improvements back, with interest.

I also want Dickhead's bunker searched and payment in full for it's construction.

[Warpy]

10. Whoa! I'm next door in NM

and I wonder when this stuff is going to hit us!

Our temperatures are fine for now, but they sure won't be in another month.

Idiots here have been pushing refrigerated air to yuppies for the past 10 years, and the power grid was near capacity all last summer because of it.

If I can't use my cheap evaporative cooler because some damn yuppie insists on refrigerated air and has burnt out the system, I'm going to be awfully upset.

My sympathies to y'all in Houston. I know how brutal that climate is.

[raccoon]

19. At least in NM the sweat evaporates off you. nt

[Trillo]

31. You could use a cooling tower.

It'd require a bit of construction. Old fashioned towers were separated from the building, the air would travel down the tower, through an underground tunnel to the house.

[0007]

12. No problem here is West Texas yet.....Most of this country goes with TUX

Do you have a link?

[0007]

25. I posted about twenty minutes ago that West Texas had not

gone down yet. We went down right after I posted and we're back up now.

[Barrett808]

13. Decline of industrial empires: Electrical infrastructure fails first

See the detailed analysis at:

Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post-American Century
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/060105_soviet_lessons.shtml

Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post-American Century, Part 2
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/062805_soviet_lessons_part2.shtml

Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post-American Century, Part 3
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/071805_soviet_lessons_part3.shtml

First, electricity begins to wink in and out. Eventually, this settles into a rhythm. Countries such as Georgia, Bulgaria and Romania, as well as some peripheral regions of Russia, have had to put up with a few hours of electricity a day, sometimes for several years. North Korea is perhaps the best Soviet pupil we have, surviving without much electricity for years. Lights flicker on as the sun begins to set. The generators struggle on for a few hours, powering light bulbs, television sets, and radios. When it's time for bed, the lights wink out once again.

Second in line is heat. Every year, it comes on later and goes off sooner. People watch television or listen to the radio, when there's electricity, or just sit, under piles of blankets. Sharing bodily warmth has been a favored survival technique among humans through the ice ages. People get used to having less heat, and eventually stop complaining. Even in these relatively prosperous times, there are apartment blocks in St. Petersburg that are heated every other day, even during the coldest parts of winter. Thick sweaters and down comforters are used in place of the missing buckets of coal.

Third in line is hot water: the shower runs cold. Unless you've been deprived of a cold shower, you won't be able to appreciate it for the luxury that it affords. In case you are curious, it's a quick shower. Get wet, lather up, rinse off, towel off, dress, and shiver, under several layers of blankets, and let's not forget shared bodily warmth. A less radical approach is to wash standing in a bucket of warm water — heated up on the stove. Get wet, lather, rinse. And don't forget to shiver.

Next, water pressure drops off altogether. People learn to wash with even less water. There is a lot of running around with buckets and plastic jugs. The worst part of this is not the lack of running water; it is that the toilets won't flush. If the population is enlightened and disciplined, it will realize what it must do: collect their excretions in buckets and hand-carry them to a sewer inlet. The super-enlightened build outhouses and put together composting toilets, and use the proceeds to fertilize their kitchen gardens.

[raccoon]

67. Those articles were most interesting. Thanks for the links.

A lot in them is worth quoting, but to me especially this:

The Soviet Union had a single, entrenched, systemically corrupt political party, which held a monopoly on power. The U.S. has two entrenched, systemically corrupt political parties, whose positions are often indistinguishable, and which together hold a monopoly on power. In either case, there is, or was, a single governing elite, but in the United States it organized itself into opposing teams to make its stranglehold on power seem more sportsmanlike.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/071805_soviet_lessons_part3.shtml

[Barrett808]

72. Yes, Orlov has a unique perspective...

...and a dry wit.

[bahrbearian]

15. Is Enron back in business ?

[lostnfound]

39. Library handout said gov't would have 'less control over elec. pricing'

this year...Must be some "deregulation" deal I bet.

[acmejack]

16. I just installed another battery back up for my system

I had an hours worth of power & I doubled that. I have been worried about just this eventuality. I can hold up all my electronics that long, if I turn of the TV and the amplifier I should be able to run for a long time with just the modem, the router and the laptop.

[sam sarrha]

17. i is always better for prices to do maintenance during seasonal peak demand

..it was in El Paso that they discovered the 'Conspiracy' to defraud California's energy prices and plan the replacement of Davis by blaming him for the price hikes and then locking them into contracts that are still enforced today.

The Swartz was backed by Enron and other of their ilk in exchange for him agreeing to stop the lawsuits against Enron and honoring the contracts fraudulently imposed.

it was discovered in El Paso the pipe line owners.. various lengths of the pipe line are assigned to specific corporations to skim profits for the mother company.. El Paso raised their fee's for the oil and gas passing thru their little length of pipe 2,800%.. that raised eyebrows and the resulting investigation pointed to Enron.

[Igel]

21. Seasonal peak demand starts in May or June and ends

some time in October. Supposed to back of later this week.

The heat today and tomorrow is record-breaking or nearly so. I'm sort of freaked: barely ran the heat over the winter, and wasn't expecting to crank up the airconditioning quite yet.

On the other hand, the threat of my computing going black provides motivation for going outside, pulling out the sphagnum, and potting up some nepenthes that arrived a few days ago.

[Imalittleteapot]

20. My building lost power at 5:10.

Whether it's due to the rolling blackouts is up in the air. We left so I don't know if it ever came back on. Hope everyone saved what they were working on. Fort Worth.:shrug:

[ekelly]

26. power at my house went out

at around 5:10 or 5:20

[don954]

22. when i lived in Texas, the politicians went on and on about

how it could never happen in Texas, as it was a good capitalist state unlike the commie California..

ya.

nice try.

[erpowers]

36. Robert Bryce

Robert Bryce wrote a book in which he claimed that Texas was a super state because they could manage their own energy, which would prevent rolling blackouts like in California. That was the first thing I though about when I heard about the rolling blackouts. That really blew Bryce's conclusion out of the water. In fairness to Bryce his book was mainly an anti-Bush book, but he just felt that Texas was the most important state in the country. I have not experience the rolling blackouts yet.

[matt819]

23. Just like the Third World

This is just what they do in third world countries. In India and Pakistan, they call it load-shedding, though it is actually, I suppose, load-sharing. Basically, too much demand, too little power. Seems appropriate, somehow, that Texas, of all places, is doing this.

[Ilsa]

28. My A/C was off all day because of leak in A/C unit and a coil

problem. Did okay for the first few hours, but the humidity was awful. We'll sleep well tonight, though, although I don't think we need it at night.

[geomon666]

30. Is there any chance...

That the black out will cause a power surge at the Crawford ranch and ignite the putrid methane gas cloud that resides in the ranch (from all of the shit living there) and blow it sky high? Please Flying Spaghetti Monster, make this happen.

[Lars39]

33. I hope the people that depends on a machine in some way

to keep them alive was given notice.
I have a feeling we'll be hearing of deaths from this. :(

[raccoon]

64. Excellent point, Lars39, and I wonder if that happened to

some people in California when they were having rolling blackouts due to Enron's disgraceful shenanigans.

Tarring and feathering would be too good for those guys.

[HippieCowgirl]

73. Hospitals & Nursing Homes were not part of the brownouts

The grid was deliberately and systematically rolled - Hospitals and Nursing homes were never deprived of power.

However, friend of mine drives a bus for DART - said that the street lights going on and off were a major road hazard. He saw several accidents because lights just suddenly lost power

[Lars39]

78. I was thinking more of the people at home.

:(

[David Zephyr]

34. Enron induced rolling blackouts in Cal was GOP's "reason" to recall Davis

So shouldn't this asswipe named Perry also be recalled now?

Or is the sauce not good enough for the gander?

[cannabis_flower]

65. Texas doesn't have...

a provision in for recall elections - but the election is coming up in November so we can recall him then.

[RedEarth]

37. Power demands cause blackouts in Houston ,,,,,,, Houston Chronicle

Parts of Houston went without power this afternoon as grid operators shut off service to make up for a shortfall of about 1,000 megawatts caused by the convergence of power plant maintenance season and exceptionally warm weather.

At 6:10 p.m, ERCOT declared that the emergency was over and the blackouts were supposed to stop. However, as of 8:30 p.m., power outages throughout the Houston area were still being reported.

Beginning sometime after 4 p.m. today, officials with the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas, which monitors the grid for 85 percent of the state, turned off about 1,000 megawatts of power. What other parts of the state were affected is not yet clear.

The power emergency occurred due to a combination of factors, according to an ERCOT spokeswoman. April is typically a month where grid operators in Texas encourage power plant operators to schedule annual maintenance since the weather is usually mild.

Temperatures throughout the state have been warm, however, and power demand reached more than 40,000 megawatts over the last few days. ERCOT officials put out a notice to the media this afternoon saying there was not sufficient generating capacity to reliably serve demand, calling it "an emergency situation."


http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3799542.html

[thethinker]

41. It is not just the blackouts that bother most Texans

It is also the cost of electric. I heard on TV this past week that the cost of electric has gone up 80% in the past two years in Houston.

We have to cool our houses or we would die from the heat here.

[w8liftinglady]

42. no kidding-we are looking at $500 electric bills here

we will be spending a lot of time under the sprinkler

[redacted]

43. Ok don't take this wrong but. . .I'm snickering here in California.

Really it's just hard for me to feel sorry for Texans over this. During CA rolling blackouts and when power bills were through the roof -- my Dad would call me from Texas and tell me that thats what I get for living in California.

Well it's a helluvalot hotter there in the summer during a blackout than it is here.

[gatlingforme]

45. LOL

[Raster]

52. I also lived in California then. And now we know it was assholes from

texas--enron--that were responsible.

[Bridget Burke]

57. Most Texans did NOT work for Enron...

In fact, you will find that most of us hope that Kenny Boy & his gang get to pay for what they did--to Enron employees, Enron stockholders & the people of California. Also, please do NOT blame us for your relationship with your father.

Los Angeles did fine during the Enron-induced blackouts because their electricity is publicly held. I trust the rest of California has been smart enough to follow LA's lead.

Whatever the corporate element in our situation here, record high temperatures have been the main culprit. This is April--hardly summer yet. In Houston, we matched the record of 92 degrees yesterday. It was 101 in Dallas.

[zreosumgame]

46. sounds familiar

A new Enron market manipulation? Here in Ca is was marked by power generators mysteriously taken off-line and lots of scare talk. Of course that could never happen again...right?

[catzies]

47. Being a Californian it's hard to sympathize - thanks, Enron!

:mad: I can empathize with the people, and I hope no one's suffering.

[jaysunb]

48. Practicing for martial law ????

just asking......

[troubleinwinter]

49. Welcome to California.

[neuvocat]

50. Exactly.

Its all for show-just something to justify soaring profits and screw consumers then screw them over again with their taxes.

[dbt]

53. We are being CULLED.

Once you get your mind around it, everything that bu$hco and the Corporations do makes perfect sense.

:freak:
dbt
Remember New Orleans

[SlavesandBulldozers]

56. culled. . . you determined this. . . by. . rolling blackouts in Texas?

i'm sorry i don't follow.

[Bridget Burke]

60. He's equating rolling blackouts with Katrina....

The blackouts might be tough on anyone using life support at home--hospitals have emergency power. And blinking signals could possibly cause a collision or 2.

But the situations are hardly the same.

[SlavesandBulldozers]

62. N.O. i can certainly understand.

and perhaps, if I went thru Katrina firsthand, I might agree that everything thereafter is a culling.

[Coventina]

66. It may be premature at this point, but something to keep in mind.

Rolling blackouts WOULD be an effective "cull" during high summer in the south.

It would effectively take out a lot of elderly, infirm, and poor.

If you have lived in the south or southwest during the summer, you will know what I mean.

[Bridget Burke]

71. I've lived in Houston most of my life.

So I know exactly what you mean.

I have no faith in the people in charge of power down here. But the heat has definitely set in much earlier than usual. ("No such thing as Global Warming.")

[SlavesandBulldozers]

80. i agree.

i went thru 3 hurricanes in central florida and the resulting power loss. 2+ weeks without power in a florida summer, but i cannot even imagine Katrina. I would never claim that N.O. wasn't a cull of sorts, but every rolling blackout. . . I think you know what I mean.

it's also worth noting that dbt who said "culled" hasn't rebutted.

[sendero]

54. My wife..

.... called me from her cell phone on the way home from work. She said she'd just hit an intersection where there was no signal working in either direction.

We later found out about the "rolling blackout".

As tempting as it is to think this is "planned", I doubt it. Air conditioning probably accounts for 30% of energy use here on a hot day. 101 degrees in mid April is not only a record, it is a high temp for the MONTH OF APRIL in Texas.

Now it is true that we knew this was coming since about Saturday, but I doubt a generating station can be put on line in 24-48 hours.

If we get more of this in the summer, all the tin-foil hatters can come here and say "I told you so", but I doubt that we will. On the other hand, the price of electricity has gone up so much (thank you "deregulation") that lots of people will be conserving naturally. Here in TX, there a still lots of assholes who think nothing of running their A/C on 72 while it is 98 degrees outside, at least some of that is going to stop. :)

[paparush]

55. Hey, W, Better get that oil flowing boy!!

[cantstandbush]

59. Another way to justify increased energy prices. What good is high

standard of living for a society that can never really enjoy it in peace?

[LanternWaste]

61. One yes and one no

No black/brown/mauve-outs at my apt. complex in east fort wortth (I-30 & Eastchase)yesterday, however, first thing this morning, a young lady in my office told me that her power went down for 10-15 minutes yesterday afternoon at app. 5:30 (she's an east fort worth resident, too).

[Zorra]

63. Wasn't chimpy instrumental in the deregulation of the Texas

energy market back when he was governor of Texas?

As I recall, he was Enron's cabin boy for deregulation.

[rainbow4321]

68. No traffic lights during rush hour

Because the Dallas area blackouts started at 4:30 pm yesterday and went on for 2 hours or so, all the traffic reports on the radio were about the traffic jams/backups caused by the rolling blackouts...bad enough being in traffic but in 100+ degree heat! Wednesday's "cool front" can't get here fast enough.

[hedgehog]

76. So the rolling blackouts caused traffic jams all over the state

so you all ended up burning twice as much gasoline on your home commutes? I've go to say, even Texas screw-ups are a wonder to behold!

[Supersedeas]

69. did the Presnit learn anything from the energy grid fiasco

[lonestarnot]

74. MORE BUSHITLER'S MERIKA!

[killbotfactory]

77. Golly, imagine if we made it a priority to make things energy efficient

And to help poor people who can't afford new things save energy...

What a horrible world that would be.

[rainbow4321]

79. Cities, neighborhoods, and DART system given no warning of blackouts

"traffic flow on Monday really wasn’t too bad," .....Um, that is not what radio stations' callers and traffic reporters were saying during Monday's rush hour.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/041906dnmetblackoutdart.4a802169.html


Monday’s rolling 15-minute blackouts caught some cities, police departments and Dallas Area Rapid Transit off guard, leaving them with no warning of when or where neighborhoods and traffic signals would lose power.

At DART, one of the first indications of power supply problems came when staffers in the rail operations nerve center looked at their wall-sized control board and started noticing electricity disruptions up and down the lines. "We didn’t receive any notice. We just started experiencing it," said DART spokesman Morgan Lyons.


Dallas traffic officials first heard of the impending blackouts from media reports Monday. As one intersection after another lost power, the city relied on police officers on patrol and motorist calls to Dallas’ 311 incident reporting phone number to help them position workers and temporary stop signs where needed.

Because the power disruptions lasted only 15 minutes in a given area, traffic flow on Monday "really wasn’t too bad," Mr. Wong said. "When there’s suddenly no power at an intersection, that can cause a little chaos. But as you start having backups, people pay more attention."

[ChoralScholar]

82. We're pretty fortunate here in Arkansas.

Even in the hottest part of the summer last year, our hydro plants at Dardanelle, Greers Ferry, Bull Shoals, Degray, and others were only operating at 10-15% capacity.