How are TX Tuggers making out?

[Passepartout]

Since I am the OP, I'm not pointing fingers but want solutions.

I have at least 4 friend with burst water pipes, causing a whole house worth of damage. And those are the ones who I have been texting in the last 48 hours. Could be a much larger number. Someone in my 75 house 5 street gated community has had a pipe burst too. I guess I got a slightly more insulated or better built house than others. Thankfully, but this would never happen up north, as houses are built to prevent this. Only downed lines would cause an outage not a shortage of KW hours.

Building codes are developed for the area they serve. If freezing temps are expected, pipes aren't put in outside walls. Thicker walls, more insulation are required. In colder climates you won't find laundry or water softeners in the garage. And, of course, in places that are susceptible to a sudden freeze, people are taught- or learn quickly- that moving water doesn't freeze, so keep faucets trickling. Pro trick here- if you have sinks against outside walls, OPEN THE DOORS UNDER THEM!

Water damage is difficult and expensive to repair.

Jim

 

[Ralph Sir Edward]

We lived though the winter of '79. If I remember correctly ... 90 consecutive days below freezing and 30 consecutive days below zero.

In DFW? Not likely! Where? (I've live in Texas since 1957.)

And could that place handle 90 straight days above 100? (That was only a few years ago in DFW.)

 

[DrQ]

Since I am the OP, I'm not pointing fingers but want solutions.

I have at least 4 friend with burst water pipes, causing a whole house worth of damage. And those are the ones who I have been texting in the last 48 hours. Could be a much larger number. Someone in my 75 house 5 street gated community has had a pipe burst too. I guess I got a slightly more insulated or better built house than others. Thankfully, but this would never happen up north, as houses are built to prevent this. Only downed lines would cause an outage not a shortage of KW hours.

We are fortunate as to how our house is designed. With the exception of the laundry room, all faucets run through INTERIOR walls. We added a sun-room/4 season porch which made the laundry room exterior wall an interior wall.

Up north, we usually don't run water pipes along exterior walls or attics. If it is done, you use lots of insulation and also probably have a basement.

 

[HitchHiker71]

But the question is cost/reward. We don't build for the 100 year storm. Do we take that money and invest in capacity to use in 100+ weather?

This is why I mentioned the grid connection issue. I’m not sure it makes sense for Texas to harden the electric grid for freezing temps - for such rare occasions it would seem worthwhile to supplement from the East/West grid.


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[DrQ]

In DFW? Not likely! Where? (I've live in Texas since 1957.)

And could that place handle 90 straight days above 100? (That was only a few years ago in DFW.)

DeKalb IL '79

You were talking 'bout Chi-town

That the region of the 90-90's 90 degrees with 90% relative humidity. I'll take Texas over that (Sorry Sandy, Houston, no so much.)

 

[amycurl]

I think, in the era of climate change, we need to expect “100 year events” every decade or so. That’s certainly been the case so far in terms of “100 year floods” and “100 years hurricanes.”

And maybe Texas could have learned more from the Enron scandal than it did


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[TheTimeTraveler]

This current issue will be debated in the rearview mirror for years......

Why not take the unemployed and homeless folks and place them to work burying electrical lines all over the country so that cold, ice, snow, fires, tornadoes, hurricanes, uprooted trees, speeding vehicles, etc. are no longer issues that interrupt our great dependance on electricity ?

This would be a massive public works project and would solve a lot of issues in society.

Wishful thinking at best



.

 

[BJRSanDiego]

To all the Texans and others who may be experiencing severe cold weather; Don't forget to leave all your faucets running to help prevent frozen pipes should you lose your heat source.

Frozen pipes are not what you want to deal with if you can possibly avoid it.....


.

I'm originally from Minnesota and when the temps would dip below -20 F, we would leave the water trickle. We were told that it doesn't need to be a lot of water to keep the pipes from freezing.

But in Mn., most builders avoided putting water pipes in outside walls or if they had to, they hugged the inside walls rather than put them in the center. Likewise, builders didn't put pipes in attics. Also, things like outdoor hose bibs, above ground irrigation pipes and above ground water meters, fire suppression supply valves, are also at risk.

But now I live in Southern California which has a warm climate like much of Texas and the builders put pipes in attics, outside walls, etc.

 

[Janann]

My house has been extremely fortunate to have electricity 24/7. We had a frozen pipe in the bathroom, but my husband was able to defrost it with a space heater. My only theory on why our neighborhood was spared from a blackout is that we are about a quarter-mile from a stand-alone emergency room, and right next to that is a CVS. Maybe the power is being kept on for those two businesses? Who knows.

 

[bizaro86]

Thoughts and prayers to those affected.

We've had about a week of -20F here, and the power hasn't been an issue, including both wind and natural gas generation.

I'd suspect on the gas side the issue might actually be gas supply. Natural gas wells freeze off on a somewhat regular basis here, because it's cold and pressure drop (which is how gas wells flow) is very endothermic. Natural gas producers in Canada keep methanol on hand to pump into frozen wells to thaw them. I somehow doubt similar precautions are in place in Texas.

 

[JanT]

We live just above San Antonio and things for us personally haven’t been too bad. It’s been very cold for this area - about 5 degrees overnight last night. Snow and ice. We’ve been living in an apartment since we sold our house last September and I can tell you more than once we’ve talked about the lack of planning by Texas in general for this kind of thing. They’ve just failed in preparing their state for such cold weather. I know they thought it would never happen but seriously, we only know the history of weather from the time it’s been recorded. So no one really knows what might or might not happen.

We’ve had power outages off and on all day today. Never for more than an hour thankfully. But we’ve been without water since yesterday afternoon because a water pipe from the upstairs apartment burst so they shut the water off. They’ve now shut water off to the entire complex.

Unfortunately the burst pipe caused our bedroom to flood. Thankfully they shut the water off fairly quickly and we had access to our steam cleaner that we have been using to pull the water from the carpet in there. We didn’t go to a hotel last night because we’d had no power outages at that point. But we’ll be heading to one tomorrow. Hotels here have back up generators and things seem to be functioning fairly well. It’s going to be days or weeks before they get things squared away in this complex.

But honestly, I feel very blessed because I know it could be so much worse for us. I read some others hardships here and it breaks my heart. Please everyone, stay safe and know my prayers are with you.

 

[bogey21]

I don't know it it matters or not but a large number of our windmills are at really high elevations. If you are driving West on the highway South of Lubbock, you see hundreds if not thousands of windmills at the very top of the mountains in front of you...

George

 

[Gypsy65]

That article is bull shit. Articles like the one you site are written by people with an agenda. Live down here and you won't be so damn cavalier. And by the way solar won't bail us out. There has been hardly any sunlight either...

Try going 24 hours dressed like an eskimo in my apartmentwith no heat, no lights, eating cold food, no TV, no Internet, etc. All at practically zero temperature. Monday we got heat for 7 hours most of it while sleeping. Today is a little better as a good bit of our 7 hours with electricity has been during waking hours. Some hospitals are closed because of freezing pipes. For the same reason many residences don't have running water. People are dying from carbon monoxide because they were sleeping in their cars to keep warm. Other had to go to "Warming Centers" to live...

Before we get totally dependent on wind and solar someone needs to figure this out...

George

I don’t get how in the day and age of information and all the carbon monoxide deaths that have been reported on for the past few decades that this is still a cause of death

If in a car. Run it outside. Keep exhaust free from being covered by snow or ? And crack a window
This has been the rule since I was a kid and it hasn’t changed

 

[Gypsy65]

Since I am the OP, I'm not pointing fingers but want solutions.

I have at least 4 friend with burst water pipes, causing a whole house worth of damage. And those are the ones who I have been texting in the last 48 hours. Could be a much larger number. Someone in my 75 house 5 street gated community has had a pipe burst too. I guess I got a slightly more insulated or better built house than others. Thankfully, but this would never happen up north, as houses are built to prevent this. Only downed lines would cause an outage not a shortage of KW hours.

Even homes in the north will end up with broken pipes if the heat goes out
Much of the difference there is that heat is usually gas or some other type rather than electric

As mentioned, If you have the ability to turn all faucets on. Even a trickle will help

If you can’t run water. Open all faucets and let the pipes drain if you can

 

[Ralph Sir Edward]

Here's a nice summary of the oil and gas situation from a major oil and gas industry blog.

Terminal Frost - Extreme Cold Wreaks Havoc with Natural Gas Producers, Power Generators, and Everybody in Between

If you’re reading this, it means you’ve got access to power and internet. Count yourself among the fortunate today. Rolling blackouts and brownouts across the middle of the country and in Texas, have disrupted businesses and lives.

rbnenergy.com

 

[Rolltydr]

It looks like El Paso learned it’s lesson from a storm about 10 years ago.

El Paso's not seeing power outages like the rest of Texas - here's why - KVIA

EL PASO, Texas -- Millions of Texans are dealing with rolling power outages after a massive winter storm made it's way though the entire state, but that's not the case here in El Paso. El Paso is not apart of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), a major grid operator that controls...

kvia.com

 

[geekette]

This current issue will be debated in the rearview mirror for years......

Why not take the unemployed and homeless folks and place them to work burying electrical lines all over the country so that cold, ice, snow, fires, tornadoes, hurricanes, uprooted trees, speeding vehicles, etc. are no longer issues that interrupt our great dependance on electricity ?

This would be a massive public works project and would solve a lot of issues in society.

Wishful thinking at best



.

It's a stretch to assume that homeless and/or unemployed people are capable of the hard labor required for this.

It took years of planning and many months of work for just one electrical line to get buried here. I think we are maybe 20 houses, could be a few more.

If there is no committment to infrastructure improvements, it doesn't matter whether or not there are able-bodied people available. Nobody will take a contract that doesn't pay.

 

[Laurie]

Texas is also the only state in the union that isn’t connected to the federal power grids like most other states. There’s literally the western grid, the eastern grid, and the Texas grid. Typically when something like this happens in other parts of the country - the local power utilities can buy peak power from other utility companies in adjacent states and use the grid to transfer power to meet critical demand. Because of the choices that Texans have made to remain independent from the federal power grids - this is what happens when the local utility providers experience infrastructure failures and have no ability to buy power from others connected to the federal power grids. Perhaps Texas will reconsider the energy grid choices made historically in this regard.

This. I hope no one missed this. Especially everyone swearing off green energy.

 

[DrQ]

Renewable Energy Is Not the Chief Cause of Texas' Power Outages

The vast majority of the shortfall is from failures at fossil fuel-powered plants.

reason.com

With respect to the current episode, about half of Texas' wind turbines did freeze up. However, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, a power grid operator, generally calculates that the turbines will generate only about 19 to 43 percent of their maximum output during the winter months. It is worth noting that winds from the storm were boosting power production from the unfrozen coastal wind turbines and thus offsetting some of the other power generation losses.

​

In fact, similar state-wide power outages previously occurred in February 2011 when wind and solar power constituted less than 4 percent of Texas' generation capacity. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's report on the 2011 weather event noted that 193 generating units failed, resulting in rolling power outages that affected 3.2 million customers. Most of the outages in 2011 occurred as a result of frozen sensors and valves and natural gas shortages. The same problems with insufficiently winterized equipment appear to be happening now.

 

[DrQ]

Heads are probably going to roll at ERCOT:

The heads of ERCOT's board don't even live in Texas

The heads of ERCOT's board of directors aren't feeling the effects of Texas' power...

www.chron.com

 

[DrQ]

Gas at one U.S. hub is trading at $999. Last week it was at $4

A polar blast in the central U.S. has pushed natural gas prices at one trading hub up 24,000% from a week ago.

fortune.com

 

[bogey21]

This. I hope no one missed this. Especially everyone swearing off green energy.

What does Texas having a solo energy grid have to do with green energy...

George

 

[geekette]

What does Texas having a solo energy grid have to do with green energy...

George

Ask the Texan that made the rounds of new shows complaining that the issue is about green energy.

 

[Laurie]

The reason we have problems in Texas is that 1/4 of our electricity comes from windmills which are frozen and thus not producing electricity. Clearly my support for the Green Economy is now approaching zero...

What does Texas having a solo energy grid have to do with green energy...

Because a primary reason for current difficulty in Texas is lack of participation in federal grids which would give Texas ability to buy from other states. So whether or not windmills have frozen (and whether or not the sun is currently shining,etc.), Texas proibably could have better met the needs of residents, if not for Texas' refusal to participate - completely aside from green energy sources - whereas you and other TUGgers have suggested this episode reduces even further your support for green energy alternatives, as if that is the culprit, for example your comment above.

I don't know the rationale for the Texas non-participation, I'm curious about that and will look it up when I have a chance.

 

[JanT]

He’s an idiot!!!

Ask the Texan that made the rounds of new shows complaining that the issue is about green energy.