Power was out for 22 hours at 12 deg F
In Houston, our power just came on at 2:15 AM, after it went-out Monday morning at 6:00 AM. AVG TEMP ON Monday was about 12 degrees.
Local utility still has 1.274 MILLION customers w/o power.
Heated the house all day with “baking steels” on top of a natural gas hob, using old computer power supply “muffin fans” powered by Dewalt tool batteries to blow across the baking steels (turning them into heat exchangers). Kept the house at ~64 degrees F.
Still no hot water; may have busted the turbine meter in the tankless water heater.
Considering that Texas produces more Natural Gas than any COUNTRY except Russia, this was totally uncalled-for. Natural gas is typically below $3/mscf (roughly equal to $18/bbl oil by btu content, except it needs no refining).
Every dollar spent on Wind Turbines (that don’t work when a High Pressure dome is sitting right over you, with no isobars to make wind) is a dollar wasted. Well, except it makes folks happy to be “doing something” about “Global Warming”. Oh, wait.....
I’m old enough to to remember The Coming Ice Age in the 1970s, and the “green” pork-du-jour called “Synfuels”, and The Limits to Growth (we were going to run-out of chromium by 2000, they said in 1970-something). If they can’t teach history in school anymore, perhaps they could at least teach the basics of thermodynamics...
In Houston, our power just came on at 2:15 AM, after it went-out Monday morning at 6:00 AM. AVG TEMP ON Monday was about 12 degrees.
Local utility still has 1.274 MILLION customers w/o power.
Heated the house all day with “baking steels” on top of a natural gas hob, using old computer power supply “muffin fans” powered by Dewalt tool batteries to blow across the baking steels (turning them into heat exchangers). Kept the house at ~64 degrees F.
Still no hot water; may have busted the turbine meter in the tankless water heater.
Considering that Texas produces more Natural Gas than any COUNTRY except Russia, this was totally uncalled-for. Natural gas is typically below $3/mscf (roughly equal to $18/bbl oil by btu content, except it needs no refining).
Every dollar spent on Wind Turbines (that don’t work when a High Pressure dome is sitting right over you, with no isobars to make wind) is a dollar wasted. Well, except it makes folks happy to be “doing something” about “Global Warming”. Oh, wait.....
I’m old enough to to remember The Coming Ice Age in the 1970s, and the “green” pork-du-jour called “Synfuels”, and The Limits to Growth (we were going to run-out of chromium by 2000, they said in 1970-something). If they can’t teach history in school anymore, perhaps they could at least teach the basics of thermodynamics...
Traverse City, Mi at 0800 hrs.
Temp 9 F. Wind Chill 3 F. Light snow/blowing snow. Wind NE at 14 gusting to 23 mph. Clouds BKN018 / OVC024.
Temp 9 F. Wind Chill 3 F. Light snow/blowing snow. Wind NE at 14 gusting to 23 mph. Clouds BKN018 / OVC024.
Sounds balmy.
We bottomed out at - 17F here in the hills at Beaver Lake last night.
Was supposed to be clear and mid 20's F today, but it's snowing again.
We bottomed out at - 17F here in the hills at Beaver Lake last night.
Was supposed to be clear and mid 20's F today, but it's snowing again.
Our temps get moderated because we are surround by the warmer lake water.
On the west side of the lake Rhinelander, Wisconsin had a low of -27 F in the last 24hrs.
On the west side of the lake Rhinelander, Wisconsin had a low of -27 F in the last 24hrs.
> -17F (-27C)
A whisker above freezing here at coastal Maine. FAR warmer and brighter than my family and friends in Texas.
A whisker above freezing here at coastal Maine. FAR warmer and brighter than my family and friends in Texas.
And Snow in Athens (the original one in Greece). Stay safe everyone in places not used to this weather.
Happens with disastrous consequences if you have radiator heat -- and aren't there all the time -- my late uncle's house had pipe's burst flooding the entire place a year after he passed away. We were preparing to sell the place and it was a total write-off!
Exactly as you describe -- boiler won't kick on with low gas pressure.
In our Ohio house we have water and temp sensors to minimize the damage from such an event.
In Texas, they have reduced their coal consumption by 50% for electric generation but have been left dependent upon wind turbines, geothermal and heat pumps. No one seems to have learned the histories of a cold Russian winter and lubes freezing.
The push to reduce greenhouse gas emissions which isn't going away.
The average winter temp. in Texas is well above freezing.
jeff
I don't know about Texas, but there is still so much gas around here I'm surprised the whole place doesn't explode when somebody tosses out a smoke. But they don't even bother to pump it anymore. I know they don't bother to pump it because I have the mineral rights for most of my properties, and used to get pretty decent gas royalty checks, but that is a thing of the past - I've seen royalty checks that were for less than the cost of the postage to mail the statement.
So this morning I got a warning call from the local gas company that their supply of gas is inadequate for the current consumption and they are going to be summarily turning people off, while the gas well 200 yds down the hill from our primary residence just sits there idle ...
And they did a rolling electric blackout this morning. Like we're California or something.
It's just nuts.
So this morning I got a warning call from the local gas company that their supply of gas is inadequate for the current consumption and they are going to be summarily turning people off, while the gas well 200 yds down the hill from our primary residence just sits there idle ...
And they did a rolling electric blackout this morning. Like we're California or something.
It's just nuts.
Only because Natural Gas Turbines aren't "green" enough. Plus, Nat Gas at $3/thousand cubic feet is cheaper than coal, and doesn't require enormous piles which freeze-up in icy rain, nor does it require ash disposal.
I understand that the PUC used-to require back-up power generation capability for wind turbines, but no longer; apparently the thinking was that Texas is big enuf that the wind's gotta be cooperating somewhere. Oops.
The experience in UK is instructive; if a massive low settles over the UK, as is common in the winter, there ARE no isobars, therefore NO WIND. You know the rest.
Daughter is an emergency room physician and SIL is a Houston fireman; they & their first responder colleagues are LIVID. SIL had 4 major fires in 12 hours. HFD ran out of ambulances from all the CO poisoning. Hyperbaric units in Houston Med Center (one of biggest) are completely full. NOW the water pressure has dropped precipitously due to electrical problems with pumping stations; daughter say next step is a "boil" order. Good times.
It's as if our "experts" were TRYING to emulate Venezuela.
Finally some change, it's not -19c anymore!
My wife (from Bali) commented yesterday that the weather is so nice and mild.
Only -4c.
I asked her if she defines herself as a Norwegian now, since she considers -4c to be warm.
My wife (from Bali) commented yesterday that the weather is so nice and mild.
Only -4c.
I asked her if she defines herself as a Norwegian now, since she considers -4c to be warm.
Interactive weather map from New York Times: Winter Storm and Texas Power Outage Map - The New York Times
My sister used to sell VZ all manner of pipe, seamless pipe, valves, flanges etc. They, VZ, must be getting steel goods from China as no one in the ROW is giving them credit.
CO poisoning in NJ -- folk will get a generator at Lowes or Home Depot and run it inside the house.
My sister used to sell VZ all manner of pipe, seamless pipe, valves, flanges etc. They, VZ, must be getting steel goods from China as no one in the ROW is giving them credit.
CO poisoning in NJ -- folk will get a generator at Lowes or Home Depot and run it inside the house.
Glad to hear your power's back on and things are looking up there. Nice work keeping the house warm (we keep our house at 65 in the winter here in NH, 60 at night). As for global warming, etc., you do understand that erratic weather like this was predicted even by the earliest Global warming scientists? (I was at Duke's graduate environment program back in the late 80s as the scientists, many my colleagues, were starting to really understand the ramifications.) While Limits to Growth was wrong on some aspects, the basic concepts aren't entirely wrong. (Even Newton was "wrong," and no doubt we'll be proven at least partially wrong on climate too - that's science.) We might not run out of Chromium (or more saliently these days, Cobalt) any time soon (demand fuels ever more costly extraction) but perhaps the limits are more tied to our impacts on the earth/climate rather than physical limits. And note that increases in pandemics, as we've seen in the last 20 years, have also been predicted. Starting with Sars in 2002, we've seen at least 6 pandemics. In the 100 years before that we saw 5 (one of which was HIV). In other words, I wouldn't celebrate just yet.
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“CO poisoning in NJ”
Oh look.....it says carb compliant, that means we can run it in the kitchen! 🙄
I feel bad for for the ones that lose their life in such a manner but the disconnect just seems to be getting worse.
Oh look.....it says carb compliant, that means we can run it in the kitchen! 🙄
I feel bad for for the ones that lose their life in such a manner but the disconnect just seems to be getting worse.
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New radiator in my car and a new battery. I really, however haven't got enough enthusiasm to go out and install the new battery as it is stall snowing.
Temperature is around zero, right now and I fear we will have days of sloshy and sloppy streets.
Temperature is around zero, right now and I fear we will have days of sloshy and sloppy streets.
My Vietnamese wife and I had that same conversation.
Darwinian culling.
