1) Major storms in the midwest US have been increasing both in frequency and intensity. Many homes have been left without power for many days at a time due to a failure in one part of the major grid.
Storms strain Ohio’s electric grid, and climate change could make it worse
“Smart meters provide information not only to customers but to our crews, so outage areas can be defined and causes found more quickly,” AEP spokesperson Scott Blake said. The company also has been installing automated reclosers and pursuing tree trimming and vegetation management.
Utility reports filed at the end of March listed 16 calendar days in 2021 with major outage events linked to wind or thunderstorms. All told, more than 900,000 Ohio utility customers lost power during major weather-related outages last year.
Companies say they’re taking steps to prevent outages. Yet some critics question whether utilities are doing enough to prepare the state’s power grid for a warmer and wetter world. It’s unclear how climate change will affect the frequency or intensity of tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. However, climate experts predict Ohio will see more days with conditions that often set the stage for storms.”
Storms strain Ohio’s electric grid, and climate change could make it worse
2) Experts have been warning that a cyberattack, a major solar storm, or things like weather events could result in major power outages throughout large areas in North America. Dr. Timothy Schoechle has been advising that there are ways to protect against this, one of which is a local network, perhaps one owned and run by the community, one that would not be seriously affected should some catastrophic event take down the large power grid. He is helping to develop a pilot project in Victoria, BC (actually, Colwood). It will be some time before it is fully functional but he wrote this article a couple of years ago in which he outlined the plans.
(click on photo to enlarge)
INTELLIGENT ENERGY: Operating System for the Solar Homes and Microgrids of the Future
“An important key to the 100% goal will be the ability to implement solar and storage technologies at the distribution level, generating local power on or near the premises where it is used. Such systems can facilitate sharing of electricity in coordination with other homes and buildings within the local community as a semi-independent, detachable district or neighborhood— known as a microgrid.”
3) Provided by Dr. Joel Moskowitz. An introduction to Dirty Electricity to which we are being exposed by things like smeters and the Optical Terminal (converter box) Telus is installing to provide the digital phone.
Kar, A., & Bahadornejad, M. (2020, October). Dirty Electricity: A Literature Review. Paper presented at the Unitec Research Symposium 2020, Auckland, New Zealand.
https://www.researchbank.ac.nz/handle/10652/5311
or https://hdl.handle.net/10652/5311
Introduction
“Clean” electricity enters buildings at a frequency of 50-60 Hz. “Dirty electricity” refers to electromagnetic energy that flows along a conductor and deviates from a pure 50-60-Hz sine wave.
o High-frequency voltage transients (HFVT)
o Impacts of HFVT on the human and animals health
o Methods of Measuring Dirty Electricity
o How to mitigate Dirty Electricity?
o Conclusions
Sharon Noble, Director, Coalition to Stop Smart Meters
“The greatest of follies is to sacrifice health for any other kind of happiness.” Arthur Schopenhauer