Last week's storm caused the most damage to Ontario's electricity system since 1998's massive ice storm. At one point, about 170,000 residents were without power.
Debilitating strain on the province's power grid yesterday forced electricity providers in Calgary to institute rolling power outages to alleviate pressure on the taxed system.
Calgarians were sideswiped late in the afternoon by outages that left offices and homes in the dark, wreaked havoc on city street lights, stalled C-Trains and elevators, and kept emergency services struggling to keep up.
Enmax, as well as other electricity providers in the province, were ordered by the Alberta Electricity System Operator to implement rolling outages in their service areas to alleviate the stress on the grid, said Enmax spokesman Rocco Ciancio.
The supplier cut power to the city's 36 power regions, one area at a time, said Ciancio.
Unannounced rolling blackouts around the city yesterday and interruptions in phone service are being blamed on the weather.
All that comes as the Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) called for a voluntary reduction in electricity use to combat a higher than usual demand sparked by the recent heat wave.
"The Alberta Electric System Operator's forecast shows that the last few days of unusually hot and humid weather has increased demand for electricity, primarily due to the higher use of air conditioning and irrigation systems," said spokesman Nancy Janes.
Around 4:45 p.m. power suddenly went out in homes and businesses downtown, in Bonnie Doon and Londonderry shortly before EPCOR spokesman Doug Downs issued a statement saying Edmonton's power company was responding to the energy-saving directive with 20 to 30-minute rolling power outages throughout the city.
I didn't realize that there have been massive power outages across the US. I only did a search when I read that a data centre in LA had been down (which is a bit of an issue in and of itself, since the whole point of a data centre is that it has backup power so that it never goes down).
Anyway, in the amazing non-conservation ("a private virtue"), non-Globally-Warming US, severe weather (thunderstorms mostly) + power drains = power failure.
As a side note, just consider how much of our civilization depends on the weather being good, most of the time. Want to fly somewhere? No problem, sail into the clear sky. Want to put up some infrastructure? No problem, sunny days.
Plus which, is it just me, or is the fact that people are drawing so much power that the wires are literally melting perhaps a sign that conservation might be useful?
Almost 300,000 electric customers in the St. Louis, Missouri, area remained in the dark Sunday night, four days after the first of two severe thunderstorms battered the region amid a lingering heat wave, a utility spokesman said.
Many [St. Louis] area residents were still without power Saturday and could continue to be until Monday or Tuesday.
As of 4 p.m. Saturday, 6,500 residents were without power in the Ironton-Potosi area. Mike Cleary, spokesperson for Ameren, said there were 347 without power in St. Francois County.
Cleary said unfortunately, they were not making as much progress as they had initially hoped. He said some of these lines are in rough rugged area and the damage is extensive.
Tens of thousands of northwest Queens residents faced a seventh day without electricity today and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said that he could not estimate when the power would be restored.
Hopes for a full restoration of power this weekend was shattered by new barrages of severe thunderstorms and the discovery of more extensive damage to the underground power grid.
The Southland heat wave caused record power usage Saturday in the San Diego area, along with power outages, reported 10News.
Saturday afternoon, demand for SDG&E electricity in San Diego and southern Orange counties peaked at a record 4,502 megawatts, and about 74,000 customers were without power, said Peter Hidalgo of San Diego Gas & Electric.
...
Utility officials blamed the outages on the weather, saying the heat was causing people to use more electricity, which in turn was putting too much stress on old equipment.
Wires have "literally melted," Donovan said, and transformers have blown.
California basted Saturday in a heat wave described by meteorologists as unprecedented, breaking temperature records and pushing the state within a hair's breadth of a power crisis.
...
As California sizzled in the record heat wave, state regulators declared a Stage 1 power emergency, urging all residents to cut back on their electricity consumption to avoid potential blackouts.
Somehow, the conclusion appears to be that there is a need for more... supply.
Electricity grids in California, Texas, the Midwest, the Mid-Atlantic, New York and New England set all-time record peaks during the week as consumers cranked up their air conditioners.
America - "Making Ourselves a Third World Country, So the Terrorists Can't Win"
makes an excellent point, which is that Baghdad is also ridiculously hot, and it has been without steady power now for years, post-invasion. Which doesn't seem to bother the American Powers that Be at all.
posted by Richard at 00:10 /
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So I'm watching Tintin DVDs in French, I don't know if it helps my French any, but it's fairly entertaining.
So I'm watching Objectif Lune / On a marché sur la Lune, and I'm thinking, holy frick, Hergé is a fricking genius, with his hyper-realistic moon voyage and moon landing, done in comic form starting in 1950.
Then I'm watching Flight 714 to Sydney and I'm thinking, holy frick, did Hergé lose his mind or what?
Let's put it this way: ancient temple telepathy aliens
In case you're thinking, Lost? Yeah.
The Lost flight was Oceanic 815, and it was FROM Sydney.
I'm sure you can find lots of Lost/Tintin speculation sites exploring everything in excruciating detail.
posted by Richard at 19:22 /
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