Lovely. Avista Power/ inentional blackout in Spokane (Spokamentro)

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67Dart273

67Dart273

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Just now turned on the "5 O'clock news." They are reporting power shutdowns in parts of Spokane. Now that cowtown (about 40-50mi from me) IS NOT THAT LARGE a cowtown. That tells me if Avista can't keep up in this little hick burg, they are way behind the curve.

And.........of course, "you know people." On person "the news" talked to reported "The only way he could stay cool is driver around in his car."
 
..........And Oh'bomb-Bidet (It's a toilet appliance) wants us to ADD MORE ELECTRICAL LOADS
 
I hear all the news about is about the PNW and it’s heat. Get over it. People think that it’s hot a few days a year with over a 100 degree days and they can’t cope. Wonder how those in AZ, NM, CA and Texas deal with it year after year?
 
5.7 hemi said:
I hear all the news about is about the PNW and it’s heat. Get over it. People think that it’s hot a few days a year with over a 100 degree days and they can’t cope. Wonder how those in AZ, NM, CA and Texas deal with it year after year?
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I'm fine. What I'm saying here is that Spokane area has no ******* business experiencing power glitches. It's not a huge city like SF. It's a ******* village. I lived most my life with no AC and worked outside in the cold the heat whatever.

Avista bought out WWP who had been doing OK and I've just never trusted them. They tried a few years back to merge with Hydro One in Canada---a REAL by Gauwd ******** company if I've ever seen one. Look it up.

And last of course is the big push by the stupid God Damned Oh'bom-Bidet to electrify everything. If Avista cannot cope with a few days of hot wx, they are WAY WAY behind the curve
 
This is a record setting heat wave without precedence. Hottest prolonged temperatures since they started keeping records. Avista is a good company trying to keep their overheating transformers from exploding and creating more serious and longer outages. And Avistas service area covers much more than Spokane, such as a lot of NE. Washington State.
 
102 here today and I rode my dualsport till noon then drove the Barracuda the rest of the day with windows open . We keep our A/C around 79 and if night time temps drop into the 60s turn it off and open windows till morning .
Gas bill this month = 14.55
Power (last month) = 55.00

Now 115-120*... no thank you ! No matter how dry it is.
 
5.7 hemi said:
I hear all the news about is about the PNW and it’s heat. Get over it. People think that it’s hot a few days a year with over a 100 degree days and they can’t cope. Wonder how those in AZ, NM, CA and Texas deal with it year after year?
Click to expand...

The difference is we’re (mostly) equipped to handle temperatures like what there seeing now. The NorthWest isn’t just seeing record temperatures for June or July, they’re seeing ALL-TIME record temperatures. Like not in recorded history at that location temperatures. Lots of places up around Seattle don’t have AC, they’re not set up for temps like this because they don’t get them. 112*F in Portland? That’s literally never happened before.

When I moved into the dorms at UCSD there was a heat wave. Temps were in the low 100’s. For where I’m at in Northern California that’s not a big deal. Certainly not record breaking for Sacramento. But for La Jolla that’s crazy. Same kinda deal, lots of places don’t even have AC down there because 99.9% of the time you don’t even need to think about it. People there died from heat causes at temperatures lower than the average temps around here.

The power grid operators get a little less sympathy. I get it, this doesn’t happen very often. Or at least it didn’t used to. But you should be prepared for more than just business as usual. Like Texas and the cold snap and snow they had last winter. Does it happen very often? No. But in Texas it had happened to a smaller extent before. And the technology to deal with it is definitely out there. The NW right now I understand a little more, like I said, they’re breaking all-time records. It gets pretty hot where I’m at in California, and they’re tying our all time highs in some places up there. So yeah, some things that don’t normally happen (like rolling blackouts) are gonna happen, because that’s where you’re at right now.

Our grid in the US is pretty crappy though. No one wants to pay for upgrades, the infrastructure is old and outdated. Better tech is out there but the energy CEO’s would rather line their pockets and pay off the shareholders. Same crap with PG&E here. Raise the rates to pay for the inspections they should have been doing the whole time to prevent burning up whole communities. Paradise burned because a 97 year old tower failed. A tower built in 1921. Like most places still didn’t have electricity at that point. Maybe could have seen that coming for a couple decades?
 
5.7 hemi said:
I hear all the news about is about the PNW and it’s heat. Get over it. People think that it’s hot a few days a year with over a 100 degree days and they can’t cope. Wonder how those in AZ, NM, CA and Texas deal with it year after year?
Click to expand...

I never read about "their" power going out because of heat, either.
 
RustyRatRod said:
I never read about "their" power going out because of heat, either.
Click to expand...

Just because you haven’t heard of it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. We’ve had rolling blackouts here before because of high temperatures. So has Arizona, so has Texas, etc. It’s not common, but like I said, it’s literally never been 112*F in Portland. Not ever in recorded history. In Arizona that’s business as usual, in Sacramento it
might be a daily record but it’s not an all time record. That’s not a realistic comparison. If it got Siberia cold in Georgia you think things would be businesses as usual? Siberia deals with it.
 
72bluNblu said:
The difference is we’re (mostly) equipped to handle temperatures like what there seeing now. The NorthWest isn’t just seeing record temperatures for June or July, they’re seeing ALL-TIME record temperatures. Like not in recorded history at that location temperatures. Lots of places up around Seattle don’t have AC, they’re not set up for temps like this because they don’t get them. 112*F in Portland? That’s literally never happened before.

When I moved into the dorms at UCSD there was a heat wave. Temps were in the low 100’s. For where I’m at in Northern California that’s not a big deal. Certainly not record breaking for Sacramento. But for La Jolla that’s crazy. Same kinda deal, lots of places don’t even have AC down there because 99.9% of the time you don’t even need to think about it. People there died from heat causes at temperatures lower than the average temps around here.

The power grid operators get a little less sympathy. I get it, this doesn’t happen very often. Or at least it didn’t used to. But you should be prepared for more than just business as usual. Like Texas and the cold snap and snow they had last winter. Does it happen very often? No. But in Texas it had happened to a smaller extent before. And the technology to deal with it is definitely out there. The NW right now I understand a little more, like I said, they’re breaking all-time records. It gets pretty hot where I’m at in California, and they’re tying our all time highs in some places up there. So yeah, some things that don’t normally happen (like rolling blackouts) are gonna happen, because that’s where you’re at right now.

Our grid in the US is pretty crappy though. No one wants to pay for upgrades, the infrastructure is old and outdated. Better tech is out there but the energy CEO’s would rather line their pockets and pay off the shareholders. Same crap with PG&E here. Raise the rates to pay for the inspections they should have been doing the whole time to prevent burning up whole communities. Paradise burned because a 97 year old tower failed. A tower built in 1921. Like most places still didn’t have electricity at that point. Maybe could have seen that coming for a couple decades?
Click to expand...


It’s senseless that all these houses up here don’t have AC. My mom and dad bought central AC in 1972. No later than April every year it would run. Usually up to October. I can’t tell you how many times we had family and friends come over and stay the night because they couldn’t sleep in the sweat boxes they lived in.

We moved 2 blocks in 1978 and that piss poor built house didn’t have AC. By the spring of 1979 my parents had the AC installed.

When we moved to their brand new house in 2014, we made sure it had AC.

In 2000, a life long friend bought a new house. When he and the fiancée were deciding on what they wanted, I spent 3 hours on the phone with them convincing them to spend the money and get AC. They are both cheap screws. I had to remind him how many nights he and his family slept on our living room floor because they didn’t have AC. And we nicknamed their house the sweat box. Because it was. That first summer he called me and thanked me for not letting him cheap screw out.

In 1999 I was working for a guy who never had AC. In fact, when I had my house built in 1998, I had AC installed and he thought I was nuts. His furnace went out and he wasn’t going to do AC. I said my AC runs from March through October and he thought I was nuts. Luckily, the company doing the install of the new furnace convinced him to do AC. He was stunned how often they used it. When they moved to their new house, they made sure it had AC.

The problem is the morons that live here think it never gets hot enough to need AC. They are wrong. Any new house should never be built without AC.
 
72bluNblu said:
Just because you haven’t heard of it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. We’ve had rolling blackouts here before because of high temperatures. So has Arizona, so has Texas, etc. It’s not common, but like I said, it’s literally never been 112*F in Portland. Not ever in recorded history. In Arizona that’s business as usual, in Sacramento it
might be a daily record but it’s not an all time record. That’s not a realistic comparison. If it got Siberia cold in Georgia you think things would be businesses as usual? Siberia deals with it.
Click to expand...


Part of the problem is these systems are never built with any margin built in. Just like our roads, which are never built with enough capacity, so to is the grid and all that feeds it. These black pits don’t occur because the grid can’t supply the power. They happen because there isn’t enough power. All the nuclear plants have been shut down. The nut jobs are trying to kill any new dams that make the best, most clean, environmentally safe power and they want to close down dams that are already operating. Which is ignorant because these low IQ dolts don’t understand that flood control and crop irrigation is a big deal. Or they just don’t care.

These clowns under build everything.
 
72bluNblu said:
Just because you haven’t heard of it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. We’ve had rolling blackouts here before because of high temperatures. So has Arizona, so has Texas, etc. It’s not common, but like I said, it’s literally never been 112*F in Portland. Not ever in recorded history. In Arizona that’s business as usual, in Sacramento it
might be a daily record but it’s not an all time record. That’s not a realistic comparison. If it got Siberia cold in Georgia you think things would be businesses as usual? Siberia deals with it.
Click to expand...

I never said It didn't happen. Why must you be so condescending when you make a point? Do you always have to try to make someone feel like a heel? Is that your goal in life? You're a smart guy and quite personable, but you can be a real heartless jerk.
 
I have to agree with YR, and respectfully agree with most all. I've been in Puget Sound, about 20 miles north of the cesspool called Seattle, for 32 years. It has never been this hot since they started keeping records in 1891. We live in an old 1920 farmhouse. Nothing big, about 1425 SF. When I upgraded the wiring and windows, I bought 3 window shakers(AC units) years ago. We use them about 2 months a year, usually, and store them in the attic the rest of the time. We also have a roll around bigger unit that vents out the window through and insulated flexible duct. I had to loan that one to my son and his girlfriend after she physically threw up twice from the heat. I'm originally from Florida, and went to Parris Island in June, July, and August for boot camp. Most people up here are soft, and have no experience with this high of heat. Maybe I'm cruel, but I find it amusing that the homeless socialists and Antifa haven't had their nightly protests downtown, and are asking the city for relief. YR could tell you it's so hot, they're picking cherries at night, and trying to save the fruit crops by watering or cooling them any way they can. It's a real, heat related emergency up here in the PNW. Politics aside, it's record breaking hot. Paul.
 
I spent the last 45 years in irrigated agriculture in eastern Washington. We design/build large agriculture irrigation systems which supply most food groups globally and I live in the county that grows more potatoes than any other county in the US. Our potatoes is where your McFries come from. I specialize in large orchard/vineyard pump stations that require 300/500 HP each. The last few days has stressed our entire irrigation infrastructure as the heat exceeds all previous standards. Make no mistake about it, there will be crop loss and loss of income and profitability to our grower base, not because of our power grid but because our irrigation systems are typically designed to deliver around .40"/day of available water and the evapotranspiration rate over the 3-4 weeks of the heat wave exceeds 1"/day. The soil simply cannot bank that kind of water in the root zone. Fortunately for us, our power grid had not had any brownouts or intentional reduction of service. It could happen though as today it is expected to get to 117 degrees here. I am looking forward to the end of this unprecedented heat wave at least for this year. Could be the new normal though------------------------------------
 
70dart340 said:
We also have a roll around bigger unit that vents out the window through and insulated flexible duct. .
Click to expand...

About those portables..........some only have 1 hose (and not a hose in a hose, concentric, etc) rather than both an inlet hose and outlet hose. The single hose ones are TERRIBLY inefficient, because they are exhausting hot condenser air, and this means they are DRAWING IN more hot air from outdoors through cracks and leaks in the building.

If you can always get a portable with TWO hose setup.
 
108 last night at 9:00 . 112 today and 115 tomorrow. Dont compare us to Phoenix or Texas . where I live summer heat is not unusual , yes records are being broken the hotter it gets the longer a/c units run the more drain on the system transformers explode fires start. Typically our HOT weather starts July and Augest. This year it started in June with 90° and for the last two weeks has been bouncing 100 + I dont know what the big todo is about. Its bound to happen .
 
DesertRat said:
I spent the last 45 years in irrigated agriculture in eastern Washington. We design/build large agriculture irrigation systems which supply most food groups globally and I live in the county that grows more potatoes than any other county in the US. Our potatoes is where your McFries come from. I specialize in large orchard/vineyard pump stations that require 300/500 HP each. The last few days has stressed our entire irrigation infrastructure as the heat exceeds all previous standards. Make no mistake about it, there will be crop loss and loss of income and profitability to our grower base, not because of our power grid but because our irrigation systems are typically designed to deliver around .40"/day of available water and the evapotranspiration rate over the 3-4 weeks of the heat wave exceeds 1"/day. The soil simply cannot bank that kind of water in the root zone. Fortunately for us, our power grid had not had any brownouts or intentional reduction of service. It could happen though as today it is expected to get to 117 degrees here. I am looking forward to the end of this unprecedented heat wave at least for this year. Could be the new normal though------------------------------------
Click to expand...


Yeah, I figured crop irrigation was taking a beating. I’m watering my lawn twice a day, 7 days a week and it’s still barely staying green. I can’t imagine trying to irrigate crops in this weather, especially if you have to use human power to move the pipes (BTDT).
 
yellow rose said:
Yeah, I figured crop irrigation was taking a beating. I’m watering my lawn twice a day, 7 days a week and it’s still barely staying green. I can’t imagine trying to irrigate crops in this weather, especially if you have to use human power to move the pipes (BTDT).
Click to expand...
Fortunately modern irrigation is nearly fully automated. Lots of web based apps and telemetry with most of the pumping requiring 460V 3 phase power and lots of it. The labor pool for hand irrigation disappeared with the last generation's graduation from high school. Zigs is correct though, we are used to it, just not this much this soon. And it is a long way to October:-(
 
My little brother (and a friend) were killed in a car crash Jul 1 1973. I was stationed at NAS Miramar, threw some clothes in the car, did a quick overall check of the car, and headed for the N end of ID. It was HOT that year, at least a hundred from there past the 4th. I had a month's leave and remember it was a HOT summer up here. I mean "here" at the home area. So "these things happen." I don't remember what the "high" may have been, but it was for certain banging on the 100 door

The US "double nickel" had not yet been implemented, and OR still had 75mph limits on some freeways. I remember roaring through OR a 75-80 with the windows down
 
Most orchards around here have gone to drip systems computer controlled. Im watering three times a day night and eary morning. I have alot of hard pan so water dosent drain. I dont mow during this kind of heat , mowing triggers lawn to grow it also stresses the lawn. Alfalfa is growing like crazy.
 
Avista ! add new customers, perform the least amount of maintenance and increase power bills.
The last I checked our monthly winter power bill to heat our home is twice as much as our summer bill and the central air runs all summer.
Not to mention all the outside lights on during the long nights of winter.
Conserve power, don't put up Christmas lights this year.
 
zigs said:
Most orchards around here have gone to drip systems computer controlled. Im watering three times a day night and eary morning. I have alot of hard pan so water dosent drain. I dont mow during this kind of heat , mowing triggers lawn to grow it also stresses the lawn. Alfalfa is growing like crazy.
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I didn’t know that. Just read it to the wife so she might blame you if I don’t mow the lawn LOL!!!
 
yellow rose said:
I didn’t know that. Just read it to the wife so she might blame you if I don’t mow the lawn LOL!!!
Click to expand...
Hey I can take it. Ya heat stresses some plants unless you have a drout type grass.
Better to skip a few mowings then cut high
never scalp your lawn.
On another note. Really close to starting the 340 . Havent been able to work on it steady. Took along time to put the a/c in
Then the heat hit
 
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