Essay by Eric Worrall
“… In Texas, a study with EMPACT Engineering found that 94.5% of the region’s power lines could safely hold double the existing capacity. …”
Barriers and solutions to Australia’s climate crisis
During the global COP28 conference, discussions led by Australia’s Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen once again centered on the need for greater urgency in delivering planned energy generation to accelerate the transition from fossil fuels to reach 2030 and 2050 clean energy targets.
JANUARY 8, 2024 JACK CURTIS
…
We need to dismantle the barriers preventing the realisation of 2030 and 2050 targets, with quick action required to resolve Australia’s climate crisis.
…
The capabilities of the existing grid are one major avenue yet to be fully leveraged, presenting enormous potential for the accelerated connection of renewable energy by removing our single point of reliance on delayed transmission projects.
Advanced new technologies such as digital modelling and AI are uncovering significant latent capacity within the power lines we already have.
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Digital line rating work has already surfaced significant potential capacity increases with Essential Energy, which operates one of the largest networks in Australia. In Texas, a study with EMPACT Engineering found that 94.5% of the region’s power lines could safely hold double the existing capacity.
…
Read more: https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2024/01/08/barriers-and-solutions-to-australias-climate-crisis/
Yep, running remote rural power lines red hot because the AI says the engineering ratings are too conservative, and green energy providers can’t afford to upgrade grid capacity. What could possibly go wrong?
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By 2050, India will be among the first places where temperatures will cross survivability limits, according to climate experts.
Of course, the link doesn’t name a single “climate expert”
“And experts say the the cascading effects of this will be devastating.”
What a tissue of silly lies. They neglect to explain how human civilization thrived in the Medieval Warming Period, the Roman Warming Period, the Minoan Warming Period. Or how humans originated as a subtropical species where the Temperate Zones of our planet could not be survived without technology.
This item is from CNN, so this is the sort of sheer nonsense which can be expected.
“Sources??? We don’t need no stinkeen sources.”
Most who ‘visit’ here, have heard FEAR statements like this since the 1970’s, or earlier.
There is nothing happening In India that hasn’t happened every year. It’s always hot in India. Then the rains come. It has nothing to do with CO2. It’s just weather.
Climate alarmists blame everything on CO2. Without any evidence that CO2 is anything other than a benign gas, essential for life on Earth.
Climate alarmists have been driven insane over unwarranted fears about CO2. This causes them to do crazy things like see CO2 in every weather event. They are seeing what they expect to see, not what is really there. They have no evidence that CO2 is connected to any weather event in any way. But that doesn’t deter crazy people.
As we Texans found out in the ’21 Valentine Day freeze, it’s not capacity it is when the weather gets bad there is no generation from wind & solar
This is all being done on computers, right? Like AGW? Again, what could possibly go wrong.
err…tripping points?
Our roads also could take a lot more traffic if people would just drive faster and stay close to the bumper in front.
That might put them into the engine compartment.
What almost nobody realizes (including a lot of EE’s) is that the power handling capacity of an AC transmission line is limited by the inductance and not conductor heating. The power flows varies with the sine of the phase difference between the sourcing terminal and the sinking terminal and note that once the phase difference hits 90º, the power flow will decrease. The factor of two difference between normal maximum load and maximum line capacity is to ensure that the endpoints of the transmission line remain in synchronism during transients. Otherwise it wouldn’t take much of a disturbance to take the whole grid down.
Good Point!
This is why the greenies *really* need to start consulting actual experts and not just “environmental experts” with a liberal art degree in history.
I don’t see how they can obtain a ‘liberal arts degree in history’, without actually learning anything from History.
Much more complicated.
Long (hundreds of km) AC high voltage transmission lines have a large amount of capacitance as well as inductance. Both of these factors lead to something called the Ferranti Effect which can disrupt the phasing and magnitudes of voltages and currents at the receiving end of a transmission line compared to what entered the transmission line at the source end.
“Shut Reactor compensation at the receiving end might help to reduce the effect of Ferranti Effect. Shunt Reactor absorbs the excess reactive power generation during no load / light load condition and thus helps in stabilizing the voltage of Transmission Line. But for longer lines of about 400 km and above compensation has to be provided somewhere in the middle of the line in addition to the receiving end. For very long line compensation is needed after every 250 to 300 km.”
— https://www.quora.com/How-does-the-phase-shift-vary-across-a-matched-and-unmatched-transmission-line (lots of relevant discussion on this topic at this URL)
Roadways can safely handle vehicles weighing twice as much going twice as fast. Of course those roadways won’t last as long.
From the above article:
“… In Texas, a study with EMPACT Engineering found that 94.5% of the region’s power lines could safely hold double the existing capacity. …”
Hmmm . . . last time I did electrical circuit analysis, 100% of the length of a power line was required to have electrical continuity for the associated circuit to carry electricity. An open circuit condition—as might occur at a “cold solder joint” with only, say, 0.01 mm air gap—would make that circuit inoperable, irrespective of the amount of current/overcurrent it was capable of carrying when closed.
EMPACT Engineering needs to clarify just how widely dispersed is that 5.5% of power lines incapable of carrying “double the existing capacity” . . . otherwise, it’s a meaningless statement.
Also, there is this relatively obvious question: how many currently-existing (pardon the pun!) circuit breakers and transformers associated with those “power lines” can “safely hold double the existing (current) capacity“?
Yep. You are talking about fuses, be they intentional or not.
“94.5% of the region’s power lines could safely hold double the existing capacity.”
And the ones that could not?
Baloney!!!
It is very expensive to oversize the wire capacity for a system it is set up for which is why they don’t do it as heavier wire to longer installation time of poles and towers to heavy equipment that requires better stable roads all quickly drive up the cost.
The City I used to work for decided to stop using poles and towers in streets back in the 1980’s by putting them in underground pipe and use Transmission boxes as the access points all much cheaper and easier to maintain.
Yes, and you can use a Ford Ranger as a farm tractor…
Power lines are oversized for a reason. A simple model of a power line is a resistor though I know inductance is also a big player. Doubt the current across a resistor and the voltage across the resistor doubles. The formula Amps*Volts=Watts so your loss with twice the current isn’t double but it’s four times. Overkill on the wire size saves power and it’s a trade off. The cost of the heaver wire compared to the power saved over the life of the wire.
I don’t understand how we can estimate capacity not knowing the season.
You have to estimate capacity based on worst case scenario.
That’s already been explained quite well:
“To everything turn, turn, turn
There is a season turn, turn, turn
. . .
A time to build up, a time to break down
. . .
A time to gain, a time to lose
. . . “
Thank you, Pete Seeger, for that succinct timeless observation!