When you have privatized gains and socialised costs as usual is at least partially true for necessities, they don’t give a shit because everything major happens and they know the government won’t just let mass of people without it and will have to help or at least give money.
buried AC transmission lines also suffer from capacitive losses to earth which would significantly reduce grid efficiency on the distances being covered in the US. we do have buried lines within cities but outside of them it doesn’t really make sense
But its almost entirely just the Houston Metro without power at this point, not the rural areas. Density isn’t great, but it should be enough to justify given how frequent major storms are in the area and how costly all the shutdowns and repairs are.
yeah, I don’t really have the expertise to know. I thought flooding was an issue for buried lines? but I guess houston is no new orleans…
The good thing about above ground lines is they’re comparatively really easy to work on and repair. But that doesn’t help if like 100s or thousands of them are knocked out in one swoop I guess
With the May power outages (I think about 800-900k) it was a mixture: one area did have damage to the main HV lines from a tornado, which is why they took so long to get power to that region I think. But most people its just the local service lines that were the issue. I haven’t heard anything about damage to main HV lines this time, but I haven’t done an exhaustive search either.
Shithole state. Why don’t they bury power lines in burgerland?
It’s because they do everything the best in Texas. So they have their own electrical grid, with blackjack and surge pricing.
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Infrastructure* is always worth it IMO.
*Excluding car infrastructure
Fr. How much must the economy lose to such frequent power outages. I suppose if you’re getting paid to reconstruct, it’s not ‘loss’.
When you have privatized gains and socialised costs as usual is at least partially true for necessities, they don’t give a shit because everything major happens and they know the government won’t just let mass of people without it and will have to help or at least give money.
buried AC transmission lines also suffer from capacitive losses to earth which would significantly reduce grid efficiency on the distances being covered in the US. we do have buried lines within cities but outside of them it doesn’t really make sense
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Fun fact: Poland did buried a lot of electric grid in cities even after we became capitalist shithole.
Not just TX. I ask myself that every time a mild storm blows through and knocks out power for a few thousand in my area.
high cost and lack of population density. I don’t think that’s really the worst part about TX’s grid though.
But its almost entirely just the Houston Metro without power at this point, not the rural areas. Density isn’t great, but it should be enough to justify given how frequent major storms are in the area and how costly all the shutdowns and repairs are.
yeah, I don’t really have the expertise to know. I thought flooding was an issue for buried lines? but I guess houston is no new orleans…
The good thing about above ground lines is they’re comparatively really easy to work on and repair. But that doesn’t help if like 100s or thousands of them are knocked out in one swoop I guess
Could be the flooding issue. Houston is built on a swamp…
It also might be way different if the main issue is HV transmission lines vs local service lines.
With the May power outages (I think about 800-900k) it was a mixture: one area did have damage to the main HV lines from a tornado, which is why they took so long to get power to that region I think. But most people its just the local service lines that were the issue. I haven’t heard anything about damage to main HV lines this time, but I haven’t done an exhaustive search either.