http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/8646
TOMPAINE.com -

Blackout:
Repeating Energy History  

David Morris is the author of Seeing the Light: Regaining Control of 
Our Electricity System, and Vice President of the Institute for Local 
Self-Reliance.

Who says history doesn't repeat itself?

On November 9, 1965 at little past 5 p.m., some 30 million people in 
eight Northeastern states and two Canadian provinces were plunged 
into darkness. Hundreds of thousands of people found themselves 
trapped on immobilized New York City subways or stuck in elevators. 
Automobiles slowed to a crawl when traffic lights stopped working. 
Millions of people remained without electricity for as long as 15 
hours.

Initially, the possibility of sabotage was considered. Eventually it 
was determined the disturbance began because of a faulty setting of a 
relay and the resulting tripping of a heavily loaded transmission 
line feeding power into Toronto. The resulting surge of power from 
Canada into the United States overwhelmed transmission lines in 
western New York and resulted in the unprecedented widespread 
blackout.

The nation responded to the 1965 blackout by establishing the North 
American Electric Reliability Council (NERC) and investing 
significant resources to improve the oversight and control of our 
grid systems. The effectiveness of these investments was undermined 
when, in the 1980s and 1990s, the federal government enacted rules 
that encouraged more and more electricity to travel further and 
further, stressing already stressed and complex grid systems.

But that didn't stop regional outages. In August 1996, another 
multi-state blackout occurred in the Pacific Northwest. Then, a 
handful of electrical lines in southern Oregon sagged in the summer 
heat, initiating a chain reaction that cut power to more than four 
million people in nine states.

Today, as in 1965, federal officials are echoing the prescriptions of 
their predecessors: fortify a system that's likely to fail again.

President Bush, traveling in California, told the Associated Press, 
he "suspects the nation's electrical grid will have to be 
modernized." Meanwhile, the NERC, The Washington Post reported, wants 
up to $20 billion to build more high voltage transmission lines to 
strengthen the current system.

But electrical engineers will tell you that increasing the electrical 
interdependence of different parts of the country only increases the 
potential for large-scale power system failures.

Utility executive Gregory S. Vassell wrote in 1990, "The natural 
limitations in the spread of the 1965 disturbance, brought about by 
the tripping of the then weak transmission links between the 
Northeast and other areas, may or may not be operative in today's 
circumstances. Thus, a major cascading power failure -- once 
triggered in one part of the country -- could spread to a much larger 
geographical area today than it did in 1965." The extent of this 
week's blacout proves him right.

Instead of pursuing strategies that have failed in the past, 
government at every level should embrace an alternative: local power 
generation. Rather than spending tens of billions of dollars to allow 
electricity to travel in ever-greater volumes over ever-longer 
distances, we should install millions of power plants in office 
buildings, apartment houses, factories and households across America.

We already have an industry that builds on-site power plants. 
Hospitals, for example, are required by law to have emergency backup 
systems. This week, they were oases of light and coolness in New York 
City. Hundreds of thousands of backup systems could be upgraded to 
become functioning parts of the local electricity grid.

Moreover, because of the increasing unreliability of the existing 
grid system, growing numbers of high-tech, information intensive 
businesses are installing their own power systems. These generators 
produce higher-priced electricity, but when the economic losses from 
a regional blackout can run into the millions of dollars, these 
businesses have come to view such safeguards as a worthwhile and even 
essential investment.

Fuel cells, rooftop solar devices, micro-generators are all available 
in growing quantities. Installing these devices not only makes the 
electricity grid more reliable, because it will reduce the stress on 
transmission lines. It can also make power systems more efficient. 
Today giant power plants waste two-thirds of the fuel they burn. It 
is given off as waste heat. But on-site power plants can use that 
waste heat, thereby doubling or even tripling the amount of useful 
work we generate per unit of energy consumed.

The technology is here. But the political will and regulatory 
structure is not. Today the rules encourage long-distance 
transmission of electricity and the construction of large power 
plants. The varying energy bills recently passed in the Senate and 
House look to further pre-empt the authority of local and state 
governments to involve themselves in electricity planning. The result 
will be an even more centralized and long-loop system.

We need to adopt a bottom-up approach. We need to establish rules 
that will channel entrepreneurial energy, investment capital and 
scientific genius toward building a two-way electricity system, one 
in which millions of households and businesses become producers as 
well as consumers. We need to develop the rules that will enable and 
encourage a distributed, decentralized, democratic electricity system.

Published: Aug 15 2003


------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for Your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark
Printer at Myinks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. 
http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511
http://us.click.yahoo.com/l.m7sD/LIdGAA/qnsNAA/FGYolB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

Biofuel at Journey to Forever:
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html

Biofuels list archives:
http://archive.nnytech.net/

Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address.
To unsubscribe, send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ 


Reply via email to