PG&E's will show us

[Tobra]

I have SMUD for electric, but it is likely to hit everyone.

They had enough money to give some very large executive bonuses, just prior to the BK filing. It is not so much where they get it as what they do with what they have.

[Evans, Marv]

The great satisfaction for me having solar is not paying SDG&E a dime. I'm about half way through the period where it should pay for itself. Some Swiss friends of mine were here last year and said something I'd never thought of. They lived here in the early '70s while attending grad school, so they are familiar with the U.S. having traveled around the country extensively. During dinner, he commented he doesn't see how a country as rich and powerful as the U.S. still has telephone and power poles sticking up everywhere with overhead lines all over the place. I can imagine it might not be so cost efficient out in rural areas where distances are great, but it would solve lots of problems.

[cairns]

What are all those Tesla owners going to do now?

[HardDrive]

I've spent plenty of time in CA. My sister lives in LA. I will never understand people's love of the state. I get the natural beauty of the state, I get the nice weather....but everything else is a dystopian crap show. It's like a place that was nice to live 40 years ago, but now has 10xs the population, and no one can remember why they moved there in the first place.

To each their own. Not my cup of tea.

[juanbenae]

Originally Posted by Evans, Marv

The great satisfaction for me having solar is not paying SDG&E a dime. I'm about half way through the period where it should pay for itself. Some Swiss friends of mine were here last year and said something I'd never thought of. They lived here in the early '70s while attending grad school, so they are familiar with the U.S. having traveled around the country extensively. During dinner, he commented he doesn't see how a country as rich and powerful as the U.S. still has telephone and power poles sticking up everywhere with overhead lines all over the place. I can imagine it might not be so cost efficient out in rural areas where distances are great, but it would solve lots of problems.

actually underground of utilities in rural areas would be less complicated than in suburban areas. there's already a ton of underground infrastructure in densely populated areas that would have to be worked around and many agencies have spotty records at best so design of routing is a crap shoot. digging up yards to take what was a line drop residence to an underground system gets complicated. you have all the landscaping, stamped concrete driveways, fences, to traverse not to mention the paving and sidewalk trench restoration. frankly it really not practical coming from a public agency's engineering/public work division.

not saying rural area would be easy, just less complicated and fewer customers to please with restoration of their property. frankly rural area undergrounding would have greater upside in regards to value, ie, fire prevention.

[varmint]

Half a million people firing up Jerry rigged generators and cooking on barbecue grills.

That’s not a fire hazard at all.

[drcoastline]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

Yer throwing blame out pretty liberally there.
The ambulance-chasing LAWYERS are to blame here, not PG&E.


The lawyers sued PG&E for what could be construed as a natural disaster.
AND they plan to do it again. And again. And again.

If winds get so strong they bring down power lines, the lawyers sue PG&E.
So PG&E does the logical thing, they cut power when winds get too strong.

If we put all the personal injury and civil lawyers on the bottom of the ocean, that would solve most of our problems.

Hey that was my idea. Corgi got pissed.

[RedBaron]

Underground transmission wires are $$$. The rule of thumb for charging a 345kv line is about 1 MVAR/mile. Underground lines are at least an order of a magnitude higher per mile so you need a lot of inline reactors.

PG&E gets a guaranteed ROI from any infrastructure investment. I’m sure they would put lines underground if the costs were not astronomical. As for opening a line precontingent, thats pretty dumb. I can’t blame them though for not wanting to get sued again. I wonder how your grid operator (cal iso) is handling all of this?

[Baz]

Seems like they should work on getting generators for everyone and making sure there's plenty of fuel available BEFORE taking this kind of action.

Makes too much sense to do something like that though - too much "planning ahead" type of stuff.....

[RWebb]

https://www.wired.com/story/why-the-pgande-blackouts-spared-californias-big-tech-hqs/

[Evans, Marv]

Originally Posted by juanbenae

actually underground of utilities in rural areas would be less complicated than in suburban areas. there's already a ton of underground infrastructure in densely populated areas that would have to be worked around and many agencies have spotty records at best so design of routing is a crap shoot. digging up yards to take what was a line drop residence to an underground system gets complicated. you have all the landscaping, stamped concrete driveways, fences, to traverse not to mention the paving and sidewalk trench restoration. frankly it really not practical coming from a public agency's engineering/public work division.

not saying rural area would be easy, just less complicated and fewer customers to please with restoration of their property. frankly rural area undergrounding would have greater upside in regards to value, ie, fire prevention.

Thanks for the education on that. Makes total sense.

[juanbenae]

Originally Posted by Evans, Marv

Thanks for the education on that. Makes total sense.

the city I retired from last year did a big underground project 5-6 years back on a pretty large thoroughfare by acquiring low interest loans from the state and PG&E. there were two schools fields on the road so no tie-ins there, a strip mall and a number of apartment complexes so there was not a ton of runs from the roadway to the properties like a homes would have presented.

PG&E did the in road "joint trench" work and tie-ins to the property panels. they sub'd out the paving and concrete restoration and the job was completed rather quickly. a joint trench if not aware is the same as a joint pole meaning multiple utilities share the facility. this being the case phone and communication conduits were placed at the same time by PG&E inspected by AT&T staff during construction.

seems all good,, no? well, not exactly. as of my moving away 5 months ago the lower 2/3 of the poles remained in place with the phone line facilities still on them!!! I blame my former employer, the city for not being more proactive in getting AT&T off their aces to get their work done but nobody really gives a rats ass there. the "not my job" attitude is prevalent at that agency...

[Jims5543]

Originally Posted by Baz

Seems like they should work on getting generators for everyone and making sure there's plenty of fuel available BEFORE taking this kind of action.

Makes too much sense to do something like that though - too much "planning ahead" type of stuff.....

Who is they? I know FPL is not supplying me with a Generator when we lose power after a Tropical event.

Seems like this is the new normal in parts of Cali, so folks may want to start to prepare for "Fire Season" like we prep for Hurricane season.

10+ years ago I invested in a 17.5KW whole home standby generator.

If I lived in Cali I would be looking into Solar + battery wall or if that is cost prohibitive a Standby Generator. I suspect the need for AC is not as great there so you would not need a monster Generator like I have.

I want to go solar, my hesitation is strapping those panels on my roof in a place where we can get hurricanes. I am not a fan of strapping crap to my roof that can be ripped off in a storm.


Edit -

I was here to post this outage map, thought it was handy.

https://www.kqed.org/science/1948809/searchable-map-of-bay-area-power-outages

[Sooner or later]

Not everyone can afford a 17.5KW whole home standby generator.

[Jims5543]

Originally Posted by Sooner or later

Not everyone can afford a 17.5KW whole home standby generator.

I read in another thread only successful people live in California. Now I am confused.

I also pointed out that the need for such a large generator is probably not needed.

At some point you need decided if you can live without electricity for a week or more with it being a regular occurrence.

I personally would not want to fight for gas, I would look into NG if it is available in my neighborhood or LPG. A small generator running on LPG and a nice large in ground tank would probably run for a coupe of weeks without needing a refill.

[Sooner or later]

Originally Posted by Jims5543

I read in another thread only successful people live in California. Now I am confused.

Lol

Damn, I forgot, Cali is richer and smarter. My bad.

[sammyg2]

Gee, I bought a house in tinder-ville with a foundation made of match sticks, and when it burned down I blamed whoever had the deepest pockets and hired a low-life sleeze-bucket to sue them and we both got so rich we can afford our own power supply, so we don't care if you have to sit in the dark because of US.
YEAH!!!!!!!!

[Evans, Marv]

Well, we will potentially be without power in my area in the next day or two. I've got my generator gassed up and plans made for the alternate life style.

[juanbenae]

this got real this AM! the comcast TV & internet that was working when I went to bed last night were out this AM when I woke up..

the local foothill news site, "the motherlode" just updated on an announcement from PG&E stating the winds forecasted in Tuolumne county where im at were not a severe as anticipated so they "may" have staff inspecting lines as soon as 10AM this morning. they did note that even after inspection, any needed repairs and the all clear it could be "a number of hours" before service is restored.

what the hell does a "number of hours" mean? at some point is my best guess...

[carreradpt]

Sounds like CA is going on the 3rd world power distribution system. Sometimes it's on and sometimes not. Lovely.