Amigo, It's Cold Outside


 
I won't debate that spray-in foam is a really good insulating material, the maintenance gent in me just screams at the idea of having to work on plumbing or electrical that been covered in that stuff.
 
We hit 32 yesterday, first time above freezing in 13 days. Highs in the 40's to 50's on the way, but it's only 14 right now. I have a path to my grill and bird feeders, so I'm good.
I saw where some folks in Texas were getting electric bills in the thousands, unreal!

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We have a deregulated power system. There are pros and cons. The weird parts is you have to go through thousands of providers and plans to choose from. You need a degree to understand what all of them mean. You can even buy power wholesale. I'm on a 2 year plan so this shouldn't effect me. I don't know about my gas bill. If you buy wholesale you are absolutely screwed.

I knew better than to do that because the company I work for got a bill for 5k one month. Our comptroller forgot to renew our electric contract so it went month to month. There was some market manipulation shenanigans that went on at that time that caused prices to briefly skyrocket. It didn't effect most people so it didn't get much press. It basically amounted to legal robbery.
 
I would have to say the reliability of coal saved the Southwest Power Pool.

I'm reading that because Texas is independent of other states in managing their generation, that they could not get help from other areas of the country. Even if they could, I'm not sure where that could've come from. The SPP was maxed out. I don't think Louisiana and Mississippi were in any better condition.
 
Dustin Dorsey said:
We have a deregulated power system. There are pros and cons. The weird parts is you have to go through thousands of providers and plans to choose from. You need a degree to understand what all of them mean. You can even buy power wholesale. I'm on a 2 year plan so this shouldn't effect me. I don't know about my gas bill. If you buy wholesale you are absolutely screwed.

I knew better than to do that because the company I work for got a bill for 5k one month. Our comptroller forgot to renew our electric contract so it went month to month. There was some market manipulation shenanigans that went on at that time that caused prices to briefly skyrocket. It didn't effect most people so it didn't get much press. It basically amounted to legal robbery.
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In GA we are deregulated on the gas side only I always get a 2 year contract which was renewed end of March of last year which was the covid discount as natural gas croaked we get charged per therm here so I renewed for 2 years at .37 a therm my last bill January and February will be more as we got down to the low 20's. $137 bucks and that was for a 3500 square foot house.

So the current fixed rate for February and the way GA does it is the gas guys have to publish a rate around the 5th of the month and it has to hold for the entire month till the next cycle. So for February its $1.05 per therm but remember that was a rate published around the 5th or whatever in the last 2 weeks it probably went up a lot more than that but they can't change it.

So my bill of $137 for January which has pipeline and tax fees based on a $1.05 a therm would be $270 if I was not locked in. People who are on a floating rate are going to get screwed beyond belief in GA no idea what TX will be I have Scana the current floating rate is $1.89 a therm so figure that math out on my bill. The fees basically amount to $66.00 a month so you need to add that in to the therms so last month I used 193 therms x $1.89 the floating rate is $365 plus at least $66.00 bucks plus the tax will be higher.

I learned the hard way many years ago at least 10 was on a floating rate the therms went up from somewhere around .50 cents to $1.79 my heating bill went up to $340 in change in one month.

I will bet anyone cause Texans are pissed that they are going to winterize the stuff they should have done before and they certainly since they have their own grid are going to require nat gas storage since they can't borrow from other grids. Forget this was a once in a lifetime event TX had problems in 2011 and 1989 and who would say this could not happen next year the reality is nobody knows.

I am pulling for TX we were fortunate in GA got down to the low 20's never lost power but many years ago we got to 7 coldest temp since I have lived here except for the the older downtown cities which still have overhead power lines we never lost power all the suburbs are underground.
 
Ours is deregulated for both gas and electric. But it does not affect reliability as only one company handles distribution for each one
 
And look what's happened to the Southwest Power Pool mix since this morning. They don't winterize wind turbines in this part of the world, because they don't expect anything out of wind in these rare events. And ya can't plan on this level of intermittency.

Wind today.png
 
Brian B Atlanta said:
I will bet anyone cause Texans are pissed that they are going to winterize the stuff they should have done before and they certainly since they have their own grid are going to require nat gas storage since they can't borrow from other grids. Forget this was a once in a lifetime event TX had problems in 2011 and 1989 and who would say this could not happen next year the reality is nobody knows.

I am pulling for TX we were fortunate in GA got down to the low 20's never lost power but many years ago we got to 7 coldest temp since I have lived here except for the the older downtown cities which still have overhead power lines we never lost power all the suburbs are underground.
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Brian, that 2011 event pailed in comparison to this one, not even in the same universe.
 
As to winterization ........... the utilities that own the power plants, can go to the regulatory agencies and get rate increases to cover the cost of winterization .

But nat gas producers can't pass costs along to the utilities. The price of nat gas is determined by the free market. The only influence producers have on price, is either to produce or curtail production. They can't raise prices just because their costs have gone up.
 
Wind generation in the Southwest Power Pool is now over 50% ............. because usage is way down and because of wind in Oklahoma.

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Iowa is #2 nationally in wind generation with a capacity of 8422 MW, but only the western 1/3 of Iowa is in the SPP.

Kansas is #5 with 5653 MW installed capacity

And Oklahoma is #3 with 8072 MW, and Oklahoma is really ginning right now, we're crankin it. And all of the wind turbines are in the western half of Oklahoma.

wind western.png
 
If there's any question this was not a once in 40 year event, I've been in this house 30 years and never lost shrubbery to winter freeze. I've lost all the nandias in the front . If they're not dead now, they will be so severely bitten back they will have to be replaced. These are normally green in the winter when they're dormant. Not sure about that crepe myrtle in the middle, it might be gone too.

I've got crepe myrtles in the back that I'm worried about and some boxwoods severely bitten back. This is gonna be a good spring for people in the nursery business, if you can find a way to buy the stock of landscape providers, it might be a good buy.

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Interesting comments here about the power grid. I sell products into the power industry and here's what I can share;
(1) I worry about long term reliability of our grid with a lot of wind power. Wind mills have moving parts that are subject to wear and failure. Also with wind, I worry about how we store the energy that isn't used, and the intermittent nature of wind in some parts of the country. I also HATE looking at windmills when I drive across the country
(2) I like the idea of natural gas burning power plants because they can come on line quickly when the wind dies down, but this does come with a lot of wear and tear....
(3) I like the idea of reducing coal as an energy source. We can burn coal cleanly if we want too, but it costs a lot of money to do it. Everyone wants reliable power, but no one wants to pay more money for it.
(4) I like the idea of more nuclear power, but I'm in the minority. Practically every ship in the US Navy runs on nuclear power, and I've never heard of an accident on a US Navy ship. Why are we as a country so scared of Nuclear power?
(5) Energy storage/giant batteries scare me because of what it takes to produce them (nasty chemicals) and what happens to the batteries at the end of their life.
(6) I'm curious about why there is so much focus on "green energy" production while we seem to be losing some focus on energy conservation. I'm not "great" at energy conservation, but it seems like building codes and other standards really should be stepped up a notch or to. Someone in the forum mentioned insulation - YES, more insulation would be better in all parts of our country, from TX to MN with regards to heating and cooling power use. Why is it even possible to still buy incandescent bulbs when LED's use far less energy? We can't buy a new car that doesn't meet current emission standards now can we?
 
I don't have a problem with wind mills. I grew up in East Texas where when you went to the beach you had to see all the offshore rigs, swim in the rainbow water and get the tar off you cars and feet. I remember my grandfather taking me to a place they used to go crabbing and the pollution being so bad we couldn't do it anymore. Take a drive through the cancer belt and get back to me about how ugly those windmills are.

That said you make some excellent points all of which need to be though out and considered. I don't think anyone thinks we need green energy but not better buildings. Most would say we need to do both. All that needs to be done in some intelligent way that's not wasteful and it's hard to get reasonable information in such a heavy politicized time.
 
John K BBQ said:
Interesting comments here about the power grid. I sell products into the power industry and here's what I can share;
(1) I worry about long term reliability of our grid with a lot of wind power. Wind mills have moving parts that are subject to wear and failure. Also with wind, I worry about how we store the energy that isn't used, and the intermittent nature of wind in some parts of the country. I also HATE looking at windmills when I drive across the country
(2) I like the idea of natural gas burning power plants because they can come on line quickly when the wind dies down, but this does come with a lot of wear and tear....
(3) I like the idea of reducing coal as an energy source. We can burn coal cleanly if we want too, but it costs a lot of money to do it. Everyone wants reliable power, but no one wants to pay more money for it.
(4) I like the idea of more nuclear power, but I'm in the minority. Practically every ship in the US Navy runs on nuclear power, and I've never heard of an accident on a US Navy ship. Why are we as a country so scared of Nuclear power?
(5) Energy storage/giant batteries scare me because of what it takes to produce them (nasty chemicals) and what happens to the batteries at the end of their life.
(6) I'm curious about why there is so much focus on "green energy" production while we seem to be losing some focus on energy conservation. I'm not "great" at energy conservation, but it seems like building codes and other standards really should be stepped up a notch or to. Someone in the forum mentioned insulation - YES, more insulation would be better in all parts of our country, from TX to MN with regards to heating and cooling power use. Why is it even possible to still buy incandescent bulbs when LED's use far less energy? We can't buy a new car that doesn't meet current emission standards now can we?
Click to expand...

Lotsa meat in that post ...................... but if we're headed to an electric economy, then the solution is obvious, probably too obvious ........... and that's go nuclear and get it over with.

The country will never be powered by 100% renewables because they have a huge problem with intermittency. And its disingenuous to reject nuclear. The fears over waste and safety are way over blown. France gets 80% of their electricity from nuclear. Germany has attempted to go renewables, they've spent trillions of euro dollars and are now burning more coal than ever before and have not reduced their CO2 emissions at all, and have the highest electric rates in the world.

We could replace every wind turbine in Oklahoma with one nuclear plant.

And oh yeah, the Germans are now on the verge of completing a pipeline carrying nat gas from Russia, so they can reduce coal consumption. And at the same time creating huge geopolitical issues.
 
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