# Manufacturing: Samsung Semiconductor Fabs in Texas Shut Down Following State-wide Power Shortages



## Raevenlord (Feb 17, 2021)

News just keep flowing that are bound to have impact on pricing for components users of this website know and love. The Austin-American Statesman reports that Samsung has been ordered to shutter its Texas factories in wake of recent power shortages that have impacted the state. The order, which came from Austin Energy, doesn't just affect Samsung: all industrial and semiconductor manufacturers in the state were ordered to idle or shut down their facilities, meaning that NXP Semiconductors and Infineon Semiconductors have also been affected. According to Austin Energy, all companies have complied with the order. A date for the lifting of these restrictions still hasn't been given.

As we know, semiconductor manufacturing is a drawn-out process, with some particular wafers taking several months in their journey from initial fabrication until they reach completion. This meas that it's a particularly sensitive business in regards to power outages or general service interruptions. The entire semiconductor manufacturing lines - and products therein, in various stages of production - can be rendered unusable due to these events, which will have a sizable impact in the final manufacturing output of a given factory. It remains to be seen the scale of this production impact, but a few percentage points difference in the overall global semiconductor manufacturing could have dire implications for availability and pricing, considering the already insufficient operational capacity in regards to demand. Considering the impact adverse temperatures are having on Texas residents, here's hoping for the quick resolution of these problems, which affect much more than just semiconductor manufacturing capabilities.





*View at TechPowerUp Main Site*


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## mechtech (Feb 17, 2021)

I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?


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## Ed_1 (Feb 17, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?


Mostly weather-related but not always.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?



Texas has its own grid because it refused to connect up to the national grids and be regulated as such. So really, this is the smell of Texas freedom.


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## skizzo (Feb 17, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?



wtf is "interesting" about them? apparently, so interesting, that you don't even want to take the time to read the news since the power outages are international headlines lol

Texas is normally a state that does not get weather so cold, including below freezing temps, and snow. Several natural gas pipelines, water lines to cool reactors, wind turbines, etc, all froze. effectively leaving thousands, if not millions, without power. the issues are currently ongoing.


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## Raevenlord (Feb 17, 2021)

Ed_1 said:


> Mostly weather-related but not always.



Conspiracy theorists might accuse short-term rollout of cryptocurrency mining farms.

There's installed capacity for both production and distribution of power. A myriad of factors, including family consumption in harsh winters, infrastructure anomalies, drought, can affect output and consumption, so it's hard to pinpoint (for us) what caused it.


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## qlum (Feb 17, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> Texas has its own grid because it refused to connect up to the national grids and be regulated as such. So really, this is the smell of Texas freedom.


Kind of funny how in Europe the grid is much better connected between countries than the US is within the country.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

Raevenlord said:


> Conspiracy theorists might accuse short-term rollout of cryptocurrency mining farms.
> 
> There's installed capacity for both production and distribution of power. A myriad of factors, including family consumption in harsh winters, infrastructure anomalies, drought, can affect output and consumption, so it's hard to pinpoint (for us) what caused it.



When the South Texas Nuclear Power Station shuts down, its pretty clear what "caused" the lack of electricity. The powerplants going down, pretty simple.

If you want to know why that shut down, its because of two factors: snow, and a lack of preparedness for the snow. We generally have no control over the weather, but we can prepare for rare events and build more robust infrastructure.


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## Raevenlord (Feb 17, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> When the South Texas Nuclear Power Station shuts down, its pretty clear what "caused" the lack of electricity. The powerplants going down, pretty simple.
> 
> If you want to know why that shut down, its because of two factors: snow, and a lack of preparedness for the snow. We generally have no control over the weather, but we can prepare for rare events and build more robust infrastructure.


There are specific factors that lead to the problems you mentioned, and I was referring to the specifics. But your point still stands.


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## 80-watt Hamster (Feb 17, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> Texas has its own grid because it refused to connect up to the national grids and be regulated as such. So really, this is the smell of Texas freedom.



The grid layout isn't quite that cut-and-dried.  Moorhead, MN, for example, has been subjected to scheduled blackouts to support the grid load in TX.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

80-watt Hamster said:


> The grid layout isn't quite that cut-and-dried.  Moorhead, MN, for example, has been subjected to scheduled blackouts to support the grid load in TX.



There are two connections from ERCOT (Texas's grid) that is to be used only in emergencies. I think this qualifies as an emergency, especially as some people are literally freezing to death. So I'm not against sending power to Texas in the ways that we can... But that doesn't change the fact that Texas built its state and grid specifically to avoid federal regulations. Heck: it sometimes seems like there are more connections between ERCOT and Mexico than ERCOT to the rest of the USA.

There's also the 2011 Blackouts: when Texas temperatures dropped to 20F for a few days and knocked out something like 50 power plants. Its not like cold weather is that rare in Texas, the last rolling blackouts due to cold are easily within living memory.


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## FreedomEclipse (Feb 17, 2021)

Does that mean that the price of things that use products from these fabs will sky rocket by 500%??


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## TheLostSwede (Feb 17, 2021)

I see people I know post on Facebook how they haven't had any heating at home for over two days now due to this. I guess that might matter more to most people than if they'll be able to get some Samsung tech.


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## DeathtoGnomes (Feb 17, 2021)

Raevenlord said:


> There are specific factors that lead to the problems you mentioned, and I was referring to the specifics. But your point still stands.


The guy who  runs the control panels at the power plant doesnt know how drive on the snow, couldnt get to work, like 90% of texas residents. Case in point, Florida, when it snowed in Miami years ago, people just lost their minds there, all for less than an inch of snow.


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## TheinsanegamerN (Feb 17, 2021)

qlum said:


> Kind of funny how in Europe the grid is much better connected between countries than the US is within the country.


Daily reminder: All of germany, france, and several small european countries could fit into texas.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

TheinsanegamerN said:


> Daily reminder: All of germany, france, and several small european countries could fit into texas.



You are exaggerating a bit. Here's the actual size comparison.

Link: https://thetruesize.com/#?borders=1...(MTU5NjczOTY~!US-TX*ODk3OTY4NQ.MjE5OTEwNTI)Mw


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## DeathtoGnomes (Feb 17, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> You are exaggerating quite a bit.


where's the fun in not exaggerating?


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## skizzo (Feb 17, 2021)

DeathtoGnomes said:


> The guy who  runs the control panels at the power plant doesnt know how drive on the snow, couldnt get to work, like 90% of texas residents. Case in point, Florida, when it snowed in Miami years ago, people just lost their minds there, all for less than an inch of snow.



not to belittle others real problems of being without heat for example, but I always find those types of situations you described....err....comical. Growing up in Central New York near the lake, where we get "lake effect" snow, which means the clouds get to suck up all the moisture from the lake and then dump a butt load of snow on us.....I just don't "get" how people cannot understand snow and ice means roads are less safe and need to drive slower. problem is exaggerated by areas not prepared with sand, salt and plows, etc. to take care of the roads. For a better picture of this lifestyle, I walked out into almost a foot of fresh snow this morning, put my truck in 4 wheel drive, and slammed out through my drive way, its business as usual lol. I'll snow blow when I get home from work!


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## Nihilus (Feb 17, 2021)

Unreliable green energy strikes again.  That, and the fact that many Texas homes do not use Natural Gas or Propane to heat their homes.


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## evernessince (Feb 17, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> Texas has its own grid because it refused to connect up to the national grids and be regulated as such. So really, this is the smell of Texas freedom.


That and this: https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...es-short-circuited-grid-modernization/615433/

The US stands to gain a lot from grid modernization from being most resistant to weather change to increasing profits.


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## DeathtoGnomes (Feb 17, 2021)

evernessince said:


> The US stands to gain a lot from grid modernization from being most resistant to weather change to increasing profits.


Our faithful and reliable politicians call this infrastructure, and there is never any money to update it.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

Nihilus said:


> Unreliable green energy strikes again.  That, and the fact that many Texas homes do not use Natural Gas or Propane to heat their homes.





> “It appears that a lot of the generation that has gone offline today has been primarily due to issues on the natural gas system,” Woodfin said during a Tuesday call with reporters.


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## mechtech (Feb 17, 2021)

skizzo said:


> wtf is "interesting" about them? apparently, so interesting, that you don't even want to take the time to read the news since the power outages are international headlines lol
> 
> Texas is normally a state that does not get weather so cold, including below freezing temps, and snow. Several natural gas pipelines, water lines to cool reactors, wind turbines, etc, all froze. effectively leaving thousands, if not millions, without power. the issues are currently ongoing.


Excuse my ignorance, I live much further north than Texas, cold is a relative term   it was -30C here past few nights lol

As other said above your post, they are not connected to the federal grid, among other things, that's also interesting.  Also with the huge oil reserves one would think they would have an excess of power and sell it off to other states.

Is the power utilities State owned or private or both?


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

mechtech said:


> Is the power utilities State owned or private or both?



Power utilities are a weird mix of both. Its... complicated.

EDIT: Privately owned, highly regulated, state-sanctioned monopolies... is how some people describe US's power companies. But really, they're only local-monopolies. There's multiple grids they tie into. Most grids cover multiple states and thus are regulated by the Federal government, but we got Texas here as a weird case where its primarily regulated by the state-government. And some of those rules are called "deregulation". Uggghhhhh... its complicated.


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## mechtech (Feb 17, 2021)

skizzo said:


> not to belittle others real problems of being without heat for example, but I always find those types of situations you described....err....comical. Growing up in Central New York near the lake, where we get "lake effect" snow, which means the clouds get to suck up all the moisture from the lake and then dump a butt load of snow on us.....I just don't "get" how people cannot understand snow and ice means roads are less safe and need to drive slower. problem is exaggerated by areas not prepared with sand, salt and plows, etc. to take care of the roads. For a better picture of this lifestyle, I walked out into almost a foot of fresh snow this morning, put my truck in 4 wheel drive, and slammed out through my drive way, its business as usual lol. I'll snow blow when I get home from work!


Nice thing about -30C, usually doesn't snow.



dragontamer5788 said:


> Power utilities are a weird mix of both. Its... complicated.


Ahhh  Same here, but we have an excess of power which is a good thing I suppose.  Bad thing is it got that way because industry left due to electricity prices, and other reasons.


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## m2geek (Feb 17, 2021)

Nihilus said:


> Unreliable green energy strikes again.  That, and the fact that many Texas homes do not use Natural Gas or Propane to heat their homes.



LOL you can't be serious...


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## Minus Infinity (Feb 17, 2021)

Nihilus said:


> Unreliable green energy strikes again.  That, and the fact that many Texas homes do not use Natural Gas or Propane to heat their homes.


Unfortunately you can't harnass the energy of sheer ignorance and stupidity, as Texarse would have an infinite supply.

I think you got lost on the way to one of Trump's tweets.


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## Upgrayedd (Feb 17, 2021)

Minus Infinity said:


> Unfortunately you can't harnass the energy of sheer ignorance and stupidity, as Texarse would have an infinite supply.
> 
> I think you got lost on the way to one of Trump's tweets.


It is the very cost of going green. No sun to shine and the turbines are froze. Coal power plants are still running and selling electricity for $4000 per megawatt. Coal is contributing over half of the electric generation in the Southwest Power Pool. If Biden went 8 years and this happened in his 7th there would be many dead cause the coal plants would be shutdown and gone. Though this may just wake his sleepy ass up that you need coal.
You know nothing other than your despise for a political party.

And whoever said it's because they couldn't drive to work to get to the control panel... people actually believe that.


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## R-T-B (Feb 17, 2021)

qlum said:


> Kind of funny how in Europe the grid is much better connected between countries than the US is within the country.


This lack of general interconnection is purely texas politics.  You won't find it elsewhere.  It was and remains a dumb idea.



Upgrayedd said:


> And whoever said it's because they couldn't drive to work to get to the control panel... people actually believe that.


Yes, because it's actually whats happening.  It's not about how much snow.  It's about snow prep.  Texas has like exactly zero readiness in this regard.

I know someone living there and roads are absolutely closed.


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## Paganstomp (Feb 17, 2021)

America's third world power grid since 2003. Just think what plugin in electric cars are going to do to it.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 17, 2021)

Upgrayedd said:


> It is the very cost of going green. No sun to shine and the turbines are froze. Coal power plants are still running and selling electricity for $4000 per megawatt. Coal is contributing over half of the electric generation in the Southwest Power Pool. If Biden went 8 years and this happened in his 7th there would be many dead cause the coal plants would be shutdown and gone. Though this may just wake his sleepy ass up that you need coal.
> You know nothing other than your despise for a political party.
> 
> And whoever said it's because they couldn't drive to work to get to the control panel... people actually believe that.



I'm seeing stats like Texas Nuclear lost 25% of its generation while Natural Gas lost 40% of its generation.

Its no small secret that South Texas Nuclear Power Station is offline: along with its ~1GW of power production. Texas is just completely unprepared for the winter. I don't know why some pundits are trying to turn this into an abstract political issue. The story is actually quite simple.


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## Fouquin (Feb 17, 2021)

Upgrayedd said:


> It is the very cost of going green. No sun to shine and the turbines are froze. Coal power plants are still running and selling electricity for $4000 per megawatt. Coal is contributing over half of the electric generation in the Southwest Power Pool. If Biden went 8 years and this happened in his 7th there would be many dead cause the coal plants would be shutdown and gone. Though this may just wake his sleepy ass up that you need coal.
> You know nothing other than your despise for a political party.
> 
> And whoever said it's because they couldn't drive to work to get to the control panel... people actually believe that.



Natural gas and oil are both frozen because the pipelines are above ground and uninsulated. ERCOT's own investigative report says *30 gigawatts *of grid power from natural gas, coal, and nuclear is offline, while *16 gigawatts *of renewable (PVGR and wind) is offline. The impact to renewable generation can't exceed that of other generators, yet it gets all the blame for the reduced grid capacity. 

Planting blame on a federal administration that doesn't own, nor operate ERCOT is incredibly funny though. The entire existence of ERCOT is to avoid federal regulation across any section of the grid, be that nuclear, gas, coal, or renewable. Texas makes their own bed, and now they get to sleep in it.


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## Wirko (Feb 17, 2021)

qlum said:


> Kind of funny how in Europe the grid is much better connected between countries than the US is within the country.


Sure it is. Except when it isn't. We had a large-scale narrow miss last month, when Europe's power grid fell apart into two separate power grids in a matter of seconds. Both survived, which I consider a miracle, given that one had a 6.3 gigawatt power deficit and the other an equally big surplus when it happened.

Power transmission grids seem to be underdeveloped and operating on their limits all too oftern, no matter where you go.

https://www.entsoe.eu/news/2021/01/...ynchronous-area-on-8-january-2021-2nd-update/



Fouquin said:


> Natural gas and oil are both frozen because the pipelines are above ground and uninsulated. ERCOT's own investigative report says *30 gigawatts *of grid power from natural gas, coal, and nuclear is offline, while *16 gigawatts *of renewable (PVGR and wind) is offline. The impact to renewable generation can't exceed that of other generators, yet it gets all the blame for the reduced grid capacity.
> 
> Planting blame on a federal administration that doesn't own, nor operate ERCOT is incredibly funny though. The entire existence of ERCOT is to avoid federal regulation across any section of the grid, be that nuclear, gas, coal, or renewable. Texas makes their own bed, and now they get to sleep in it.


Cooling water installations in power plants froze too. Indeed, _cooling water_.


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## Caring1 (Feb 17, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?


Stupidity.
Allowing large manufacturers to draw off the grid without their own generating facilities.
Imagine if they were self sufficient in power, they could even sell back to the grid and make even more in tax breaks etc.


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## dinmaster (Feb 18, 2021)

a reason to hike prices for samsung? The whole thing happening in texas is going to push people to go solar/off the grid because it cant be counted on. i have a good grid here but i still want to move off of it because the prices are nuts, im a heavy user and it would we cheaper for me to go off grid, once you factor in the price per kwh and the delivery fees/taxes..


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## Upgrayedd (Feb 18, 2021)

dinmaster said:


> a reason to hike prices for samsung? The whole thing happening in texas is going to push people to go solar/off the grid because it cant be counted on. i have a good grid here but i still want to move off of it because the prices are nuts, im a heavy user and it would we cheaper for me to go off grid, once you factor in the price per kwh and the delivery fees/taxes..


You realize the clouds are out during this right?


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## dinmaster (Feb 18, 2021)

Upgrayedd said:


> You realize the clouds are out during this right?


You realize solar panels pick up uv right? it collects less, something like 85% less but still collects something.. cloudy solar power


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 18, 2021)

Upgrayedd said:


> You realize the clouds are out during this right?





			ERCOT MIS
		


You know that we can look up how much power ERCOT is getting from Solar *right now*, right? Solar makes plenty of energy, even on cloudy days. (Solar of course makes more energy on sunny days)


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## remixedcat (Feb 18, 2021)

Good tech companies in TX should Come to WV we have been impacted way less by this and we don't rely on silly little windmills... haha


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## nexus290 (Feb 18, 2021)

Upgrayedd said:


> It is the very cost of going green. No sun to shine and the turbines are froze. Coal power plants are still running and selling electricity for $4000 per megawatt. Coal is contributing over half of the electric generation in the Southwest Power Pool. If Biden went 8 years and this happened in his 7th there would be many dead cause the coal plants would be shutdown and gone. Though this may just wake his sleepy ass up that you need coal.
> You know nothing other than your despise for a political party.
> 
> And whoever said it's because they couldn't drive to work to get to the control panel... people actually believe that.


Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.  This is the headlines of an article I found from a Texan newspaper​
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-storm/ 

Officials for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages most of Texas’ grid,* said the primary cause of the outages Tuesday appeared to be the state’s natural gas providers.* Many are not designed to withstand such low temperatures on equipment or during production.


By some estimates, nearly half of the state’s natural gas production has screeched to a halt due to the extremely low temperatures, while freezing components at natural gas-fired power plants have forced some operators to shut down.


*“Texas is a gas state,” *said Michael Webber, an energy resources professor at the University of Texas at Austin.


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## Flanker (Feb 18, 2021)

Sucks for the people that are freezing 
Stay safe everyone


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## claes (Feb 18, 2021)

I thought this was an interesting article about the culture wars between liberals and conservatives surrounding this discussion, and details how energy production works in the US, highlighting this event and other blackouts in Texas history, but, trigger warning: it’s from a socialist magazine (that I generally disagree with). Don’t worry — they dig on liberals as much as they do conservatives. 









						Millions of Texans Are Freezing Right Now — Our Deregulated Electrical Grid Is to Blame
					

What Texans are suffering through is a failure of deregulation and markets — a neoliberal ideology promoted not just by the fossil-fuel-loving right, but even many environmentally conscious liberals.




					jacobinmag.com
				




Not trying to get into a debate about economics or politics or whatever, but I felt that reframing the conversation in terms of profitability rather than fossils vs renewables is a helpful way to look at this problem.

(Gonna run to the liquor store now before I get trolled to death  )

edit: please feel free to delete mods — not trying to start an argument as much as shift the debate


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## BArms (Feb 18, 2021)

It's been said repeatedly by many that all those liberals fleeing California for Texas will bring all their problems with them. Well, the power outages just arrived 

Sorry, I couldn't resist, lighten up y'all.


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## Why_Me (Feb 18, 2021)

nexus290 said:


> Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.  This is the headlines of an article I found from a Texan newspaper​
> https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-storm/
> 
> Officials for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages most of Texas’ grid,* said the primary cause of the outages Tuesday appeared to be the state’s natural gas providers.* Many are not designed to withstand such low temperatures on equipment or during production.
> ...


I live in Alaska.  Any gas lines south of the Brooks Mountain Range are buried as I'm sure Texas buries their gas lines also and that's the insulation ... dirt. As far as it being too cold for the gas to come up from the wells .. that's a lie.  Temps up on Alaska's north slope (Arctic Ocean) hit -70F and it has zero affect on the gas coming up from those wells.


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## Nihilus (Feb 18, 2021)

Minus Infinity said:


> Unfortunately you can't harnass the energy of sheer ignorance and stupidity, as Texarse would have an infinite supply.
> 
> I think you got lost on the way to one of Trump's tweets.



If only snarkiness could power the world...


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## Fouquin (Feb 18, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> I live in Alaska.  Any gas lines south of the Brooks Mountain Range are buried as I'm sure Texas buries their gas lines also and that's the insulation ... dirt. As far as it being too cold for the gas to come up from the wells .. that's a lie.  Temps up on Alaska's north slope (Arctic Ocean) hit -70F and it has zero affect on the gas coming up from those wells.



Pipelines existing in Alaska aren't the pipelines in Texas. Just as wind generators in Sweden aren't wind generators in Texas. They don't have winterized infrastructure, and that allowed a winter event to cause grid failure.

Your anecdotes are meaningless to the facts.


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## Why_Me (Feb 18, 2021)

Fouquin said:


> Pipelines existing in Alaska aren't the pipelines in Texas. Just as wind generators in Sweden aren't wind generators in Texas. They don't have winterized infrastructure, and that allowed a winter event to cause grid failure.
> 
> Your anecdotes are meaningless to the facts.


I guess you failed to read my post.  We bury our gas lines in the dirt as I'm guessing Texas does also.  That's the insulation .. dirt.  You can easily google it.  And again as far as it being too cold for the gas to come up from those wells .. I'm not buying it.  I've worked in -60 to -74F temps and we never had an issue with the gas coming up from those wells.  Gas lines aren't exactly rocket science.


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## Fouquin (Feb 18, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> I guess you failed to read my post.  We bury our gas lines in the dirt as I'm guessing Texas does also.  That's the insulation .. dirt.  You can easily google it.  And again as far as it being too cold for the gas to come up from those wells .. I'm not buying it.  I've worked in -60 to -74F temps and we never had an issue with the gas coming up from those wells.  Gas lines aren't exactly rocket science.



It is you who failed to read and comprehend.









Above ground infrastructure belonging to Atmos Energy in Throckmorton, TX. This and other above ground infrastructure subject to winter events across the state are what we're talking about here.


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## Why_Me (Feb 18, 2021)

Fouquin said:


> It is you who failed to read and comprehend.
> 
> View attachment 188812
> View attachment 188813
> ...


That's a pic of a monitoring station .. all it does is monitor the gas so they know how much to charge (cubic ft.).  The gas line going into my cabin goes 3/4 of the way around the outside of this place and none of its insulated.  I've had -40 temps multiple times and have never had an issue.


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## Gmr_Chick (Feb 18, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> There are two connections from ERCOT (Texas's grid) that is to be used only in emergencies. I think this qualifies as an emergency, especially as some people are literally freezing to death. So I'm not against sending power to Texas in the ways that we can... But that doesn't change the fact that Texas built its state and grid specifically to avoid federal regulations. Heck: it sometimes seems like there are more connections between ERCOT and Mexico than ERCOT to the rest of the USA.
> 
> There's also the 2011 Blackouts: when Texas temperatures dropped to 20F for a few days and knocked out something like 50 power plants. *Its not like cold weather is that rare in Texas, the last rolling blackouts due to cold are easily within living memory.*


To add to this. Even before the winter storm hit, officials there knew it was coming, and yet, nobody could be bothered to prepare for the damn thing? That's just a failure in state leadership from top to bottom if you ask me. 

A part of me also believes this is karma's way of bitch slapping Ted Cruz for the tweet he did last August mocking California due to the fact that the state was in the midst of a brutal heat wave at the time and as a result, the governor called for rolling blackouts to help ease the strain on the grid. We hadn't had to do rolling blackouts since 2001. 

That aside, I truly feel for the folks having to suffer through this.


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## Fatalfury (Feb 18, 2021)

and they wanted to MOVE the Semiconductor manufacturing from China to the US..lol
US seem to even struggling with the basics..not sure how they gonna keep up with the labour and pay while making cost effective products..

When Some fab in China stops Manufacturing for 30Mins due to  some Fire or other natural Calamity,
It increase world wide prices by 5-10%.

lol thinking what would be the Case if its like this in the US.

thank God the manufacturing of 7/5nm process has not yet commenced by TSMC or Samsung in the US.
that would be mean prices increase by 50% for all Qualcomm/AMD/Nvidia chips...


Hope the US fix thier problems by 2023/2024 when real manfacturing starts in  5  and 3Nm


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## InVasMani (Feb 18, 2021)

FreedomEclipse said:


> Does that mean that the price of things that use products from these fabs will sky rocket by 500%??


If you have to ask you can't afford it...



DeathtoGnomes said:


> Our faithful and reliable politicians call this infrastructure, and there is never any money to update it.


There is money to update it, but they won't take the pay cuts to help do so.


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## JustAnEngineer (Feb 18, 2021)

It's sad to see the B.S. story blaming wind power for ERCOT's epic failure being spread on a tech site like this.

Four days later, ERCOT is still experiencing a 15+ GW shortfall of operating generators.  That's more than all of the renewable power sources combined.  The 30 GW of natural gas, coal and nuclear power capacity that went off-line is a whole lot more significant than freezing up half of the windmills.

The charts here don't tell lies:
https://www.eia.gov/beta/electricity/gridmonitor/dashboard/electric_overview/US48/US48

ERCOT generation at midnight Sunday night:
43.0 GW Natural Gas
10.8 GW Coal
5.5 GW Wind
5.1 GW Nuclear
0.2 GW Hydro
0.03 GW Other
0.0 GW Solar
1.2 GW imported power from neighboring regions
===
65.8 GW total supplied to customers

ERCOT generation at midnight Wednesday night:
27.9 GW Natural Gas
7.2 GW Coal
2.9 GW Wind
3.8 GW Nuclear
0.1 GW Hydro
0.02 GW Other
0.0 GW Solar
0.8 GW imported power from neighboring regions
===
42.7 GW total supplied to customers
-58.0 GW projected demand
===
15.3 GW of customer demand blacked out.


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## Vayra86 (Feb 18, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?



Shite infrastructure maintenance, ancient hardware, etc. Its basically always about money and being compliant with rules. Somehow there is always wiggle room to topple solid and robust systems like that. Its never a real accident. Someone fucked up and then tried to hide it, or just simply is too spineless to escalate in such a way that it sticks.

This applies almost to every such accident in one way or another. People being people, hypocrites, spineless, or just not committed. Usually in the upper levels.



JustAnEngineer said:


> It's sad to see the B.S. story blaming wind power for ERCOT's epic failure being spread on a tech site like this.
> 
> Four days later, ERCOT is still experiencing a 15+ GW shortfall of operating generators.  That's more than all of the renewable power sources combined.  The 30 GW of natural gas, coal and nuclear power capacity that went off-line is a whole lot more significant than freezing up half of the windmills.
> 
> ...



Maybe this is how they're trying to reach their carbon emission reduction targets? 

Its possibly not even a joke, that's the sad part.


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## Wirko (Feb 18, 2021)

FreedomEclipse said:


> Does that mean that the price of things that use products from these fabs will sky rocket by 500%??


To bring a little hope here: this kind of weather doesn't come suddenly. Fabs were likely given advance warnings a day or two before they had to stop the process, and likely they weren't forced to cut consumption to zero, so they could keep some furnaces running etc., to minimise the damage. 
It will be closer to 200%, not 500%.


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## Why_Me (Feb 18, 2021)

https://www.statesman.com/story/new...ural-gas-renewable-green-new-deal/6780546002/

_As of Wednesday, 46,000 megawatts of generation were offline, with 185 generating plants tripped. ERCOT officials said 28,000 megawatts came from coal, gas and nuclear plants, and 18,000 megawatts were from solar and wind. _


This is the part I'm calling bs on.  Natural gas doesn't freeze in 25F temps ... not even close.  Someone dropped the ball for whatever reason(s) and they're coming up with some excuses that nobody with an IQ north of a turnip is going to buy into.

_Cohan also said some natural gas plants may not have been able to get adequate supply of gas to be converted into electricity, too.

"This is far beyond what the power system operators expected, a far deeper freeze and a far worse performance from our natural gas power plants than anyone anticipated," Cohan said._


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## Wirko (Feb 18, 2021)

Vayra86 said:


> Somehow there is always wiggle room to topple solid and robust systems like that.


Wires are thick, pylons are strong, power plants are magnificently big, all giving an impression of being robust and resistant. But these systems are fragile and fully loaded much of the time, and a small failure can have greatest consequences for a large part of a continent.


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## Vayra86 (Feb 18, 2021)

Wirko said:


> Wires are thick, pylons are strong, power plants are magnificently big, all giving an impression of being robust and resistant. But these systems are fragile and fully loaded much of the time, and a small failure can have greatest consequences for a large part of a continent.



That's what redundant systems are for. Redundant systems however cost money doing nothing else other than 'being redundant'. Those are the first measures that suffer when money dries up.

We have similar problems in NL, except not with power supply, but other basics like healthcare, where everything is managed so tightly that the pandemic showed us a glaring lack of, for example, IC beds. We can't handle anything before all signs turn red in that sense. In comparison, Germany had thousands of them ready to go. Its the same principle: do you have redundancy when things go really wrong.

Its really about how you manage a country and spend tax payers money. We need to have an opinion on this and we need to voice it. These are the most basic needs a government has to facilitate, and if they choose to use the tool 'market' for it, they damn well better make sure they regulate and inspect it proper.


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## remixedcat (Feb 18, 2021)

Wirko said:


> To bring a little hope here: this kind of weather doesn't come suddenly. Fabs were likely given advance warnings a day or two before they had to stop the process, and likely they weren't forced to cut consumption to zero, so they could keep some furnaces running etc., to minimise the damage.
> It will be closer to 200%, not 500%.


Companies like Samsung have custom weather data and private meteorologists that give them premium forecasts that are real and not the fake Disney forecasts us plebs get.. lol. 

Those custom forecasters also assist in mitigation as well. And also they work with insurance as well.  So those companies can cover their asses..


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## Upgrayedd (Feb 18, 2021)

nexus290 said:


> Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.  This is the headlines of an article I found from a Texan newspaper​
> https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-storm/
> 
> Officials for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages most of Texas’ grid,* said the primary cause of the outages Tuesday appeared to be the state’s natural gas providers.* Many are not designed to withstand such low temperatures on equipment or during production.
> ...


Ok. Why are you replying to me though? I said nothing about Texas in particular or natural gas.


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## Vayra86 (Feb 18, 2021)

nexus290 said:


> Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.  This is the headlines of an article I found from a Texan newspaper​
> https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-storm/
> 
> Officials for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages most of Texas’ grid,* said the primary cause of the outages Tuesday appeared to be the state’s natural gas providers.* Many are not designed to withstand such low temperatures on equipment or during production.
> ...


Natural shale gas is a political decision with no regard for the long term or your future generstions. You guys are quite simply 'fracked' beyobd all recognition and this is how that bill gets paid. No redundant energy sources and dependant on finite and high risk sources. There was always a good reason to minimize gas usage. Its costly and vulnerable, more so than many others.

Next: bio fuels made of trees. Soon youll be a desert entirely. The energy economy the US developed is going to backfire in a big way if it isnt already. The real question is if you can even turn all that corruption around, ever.

The rabbit hole is so deep a vast portion of the electorate has already effectively disconnected from future perspective over the last pres. term and the current opposition has no real backbone left to speak of. Good luck with that...


----------



## dragontamer5788 (Feb 18, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> Any gas lines south of the Brooks Mountain Range are buried as I'm sure Texas buries their gas lines also and that's the insulation ... dirt.




__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1361677146595459073





Texas's gas lines don't seem to be buried, or insulated, at all. Its clear that they're completely unprepared for any kind of cold weather. You can't just assume cold-weather competence from southerners like you do with fellow Alaskans.

EDIT: In my experience with southerners, they'll be driving around in their summer tire slicks, slipping and sliding on 2-degree inclines and getting stuck on the side of the road in these conditions. With "luck", you'll see a lot of them jamming their foots on the pedals as hard as possible, wondering why they have no friction as their tires spin. The very idea of freezing is alien to them, and many have no practical experience with freezing conditions (be it driving, living, or well... building power plants it seems). I'm not surprised to see that they've built their power plants in this manner.


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## cheapcomputers (Feb 18, 2021)

It amusing seeing people that can't stand harnessing a good source of energy from wind.

If you look at power outage maps, one of the least effected areas of the state is the Texas panhandle. That's the coldest part of the state running a large number of wind turbines.


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## ThrashZone (Feb 18, 2021)

Hi,
Texas uses more wind power than any other state in the USA think it was nearly 20%


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 18, 2021)

cheapcomputers said:


> It amusing seeing people that can't stand harnessing a good source of energy from wind.
> 
> If you look at power outage maps, one of the least effected areas of the state is the Texas panhandle. That's the coldest part of the state running a large number of wind turbines.



Wind Turbines work fine in cold environments, so long as you're prepared. See Ross Island, Antarctica: https://www.meridianenergy.co.nz/who-we-are/our-power-stations/wind/ross-island

The issue isn't "wind turbines". Its the comical lack of preparedness for cold conditions. Its not just ~15GWs of Wind that shut down, but 30GWs of *nuclear*, coal, and natural gas plants. Frozen pipes, preventing the flow of water into the nuclear plants shut them down. Frozen pipes preventing natural gas plants from operating. Etc. etc. It seems like huge swaths of the Texas power-grid is not weatherized at all.

Hint: Bury your gas / water lines that feed your power plants *before* the next storm hits.


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## Wirko (Feb 18, 2021)

For the gas that is actually used in TX power plants, what's the temperature at which it becomes too thick? It should be low enough to not cause trouble if it's mostly methane and ethane.


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## tfdsaf (Feb 18, 2021)

mechtech said:


> I've always found the power issues in the states interesting.  What are the main reasons this happens?


Too much reliance on "green energy", Texas shut down at least 30% of its coal and gas power and in its stead put up windmills, which about 15% of them froze up during the cold temperatures these past weeks. 

They shut down about 30% gas and coal and put up windmills at about 30% power, but it turns out the windmills average power was much smaller than their max power production, so they ended up only replacing about 25% of the power they shut down and like we are seeing now in these very cold weeks the windmills just froze up completely!


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## Why_Me (Feb 18, 2021)

cheapcomputers said:


> It amusing seeing people that can't stand harnessing a good source of energy from wind.
> 
> If you look at power outage maps, one of the least effected areas of the state is the Texas panhandle. That's the coldest part of the state running a large number of wind turbines.


It's even more amusing that some people put so much faith into windmill farms.  Just ask the Germans who tout green energy yet are having the Russians build them a second gas line (Nordstream 2) but only after screwing the Hungarians for attempting to do the same (Southstream).



Vayra86 said:


> Natural shale gas is a political decision with no regard for the long term or your future generstions. You guys are quite simply 'fracked' beyobd all recognition and this is how that bill gets paid. No redundant energy sources and dependant on finite and high risk sources. There was always a good reason to minimize gas usage. Its costly and vulnerable, more so than many others.
> 
> Next: bio fuels made of trees. Soon youll be a desert entirely. The energy economy the US developed is going to backfire in a big way if it isnt already. The real question is if you can even turn all that corruption around, ever.
> 
> The rabbit hole is so deep a vast portion of the electorate has already effectively disconnected from future perspective over the last pres. term and the current opposition has no real backbone left to speak of. Good luck with that...


Funny that seeing how the Dutch are knee deep with the Germans when it comes to importing Russian natural gas.  Natural gas is clean and easy hence the reason its the #1 source of energy for northern Europe, the US and Canada.



dragontamer5788 said:


> __ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1361677146595459073
> View attachment 188913
> 
> Texas's gas lines don't seem to be buried, or insulated, at all. Its clear that they're completely unprepared for any kind of cold weather. You can't just assume cold-weather competence from southerners like you do with fellow Alaskans.
> ...


Those are pics of gas lines covered in ice going into a building.  That's no reason for those lines to freeze.  Again gas can go through uninsulated lines without a problem in subzero temps which I highly doubt Texas had.   There's more to this story than what's being reported.


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## ThrashZone (Feb 18, 2021)

Hi,
Yeah water/ rain freezes on... metal pipes nothing new there lol 
Water pipes that's when you run into problems especially cold water pipes.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 18, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> Those are pics of gas lines covered in ice going into a building.  That's no reason for those lines to freeze.  Again gas can go through uninsulated lines without a problem in subzero temps which I highly doubt Texas had.   There's more to this story than what's being reported.




__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1361695199924215813


> Main story continues to be the failure of thermal power plants -- natural gas, coal, and nuclear plants -- which ERCOT counts on to be there when needed. They've failed. Of about 70,000 MW of thermal plants in ERCOT, ~25-30,000 MW have been out since Sunday night. Huge problem.



There's a *lot* of different plants that failed all across Texas. Every case will be different.

The main issue I'm seeing is that *water pipes* froze. Without water, a nuclear-power plant cannot generate electricity and is thus forced to shut down. A frozen above-ground pipe *absolutely* could mean frozen water preventing the operation of a power plant. I'm seeing reports from ~5F to ~15F weather across Texas: low enough to freeze an uninsulated water pipe for sure.

Solar Power seems to be the most reliable in these winter circumstances, strangely enough.


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## Caring1 (Feb 18, 2021)

dragontamer5788 said:


> __ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1361677146595459073
> View attachment 188913


So some "blonde" posts pics of machinery and water lines with ice on it as an explanation as to why gas lines are frozen?


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## Slizzo (Feb 18, 2021)

Regardless of everything else, Texas' refusal to adhere to federal regulations in regards to hardening power for weather is what cause them to get into this conundrum. Fed regs require hardening the grid to the same guidelines that Alaska or any other state must do.


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## First Strike (Feb 19, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> Again gas can go through uninsulated lines without a problem in subzero temps which I highly doubt Texas had.   There's more to this story than what's being reported.


First law of physics: *Nobody sends uncompressed gas*. If you compress a gas with *200-1500 psi* pressure, then they will surely freeze in a much higher tempereture. 

Ethane for example, turns into liquid around merely -10 F at 200 psi, as opposed to -127 F in normal pressure. If you choose a heavy mix and a high pressure, of course *it WILL freeze*.

Second law of physics: If you decompress a gas at the receiving side, for every 100 psi you drop, the temperature will drop by 7 F and begin to freeze other stuff.
And: Don't assume everyone transport gas with absolute no traces of water vapor. The Fed may have regulations on vapor concentrations, but it's TEXAS!

Yes, *even if the gas arrived in gaseous form*, if you do not reserve enough heating power, your machines and pipes will experience an icestorm. Do you dare to turn on the valves?


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## ratirt (Feb 19, 2021)

Slizzo said:


> Regardless of everything else, Texas' refusal to adhere to federal regulations in regards to hardening power for weather is what cause them to get into this conundrum. Fed regs require hardening the grid to the same guidelines that Alaska or any other state must do.


They have the right to refuse. Preparedness people say here. I understand you can't predict the weather but will you suspect snow in places like Kenya for example? There wasn't snowing ever and why would you spend a lot of cash to prepare for something happening with a rarity of a I don't know, a huge meteor strike threatening Earth? No one is going to prepare for something like that and spend a lot of cash when it may happen once a 100 years or never. Has anyone seen snow and temp 20F in TX up until now? I've never seen one is Odessa TX and I don't know anyone who might have seen it. It's an anomaly, one time thing, It's not gonna be like that every year.


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## JustAnEngineer (Feb 19, 2021)

A large asteroid strike is about a 1 in 1,000,000 year event.  A hard freeze in Texas is about a 1 in 10 year event.  They are not equivalent risks.  You definitely should have planned for one of these scenarios.
El Paso had a hard freeze that affected their power generation plants in 2011.  After that event, the local utility spent $4½ million to repair and winterize their facilities and they updated their design and maintenance guidelines to consider colder weather.  Guess who's still got power this week when most of Texas is failing hard.


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## mechtech (Feb 19, 2021)

tfdsaf said:


> Too much reliance on "green energy", Texas shut down at least 30% of its coal and gas power and in its stead put up windmills, which about 15% of them froze up during the cold temperatures these past weeks.
> 
> They shut down about 30% gas and coal and put up windmills at about 30% power, but it turns out the windmills average power was much smaller than their max power production, so they ended up only replacing about 25% of the power they shut down and like we are seeing now in these very cold weeks the windmills just froze up completely!


Interesting.  I never heard of windmills freezing up here in Canada.  Maybe we got the ‘winter’ grade?


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## Fourstaff (Feb 19, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> Those are pics of gas lines covered in ice going into a building.  That's no reason for those lines to freeze.  Again gas can go through uninsulated lines without a problem in subzero temps which I highly doubt Texas had.   There's more to this story than what's being reported.



All it takes is a few instruments to freeze for the whole pipeline network to shut in due to safety concerns. 

As for gas production, its regular practice for to inject MEG to fight hydrates forming here (ambient temps of 20-30C), I can imagine that there will be wells which will be unable to flow due to the low temps. Source: I work in E&P (aka oil/gas production).


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## 80-watt Hamster (Feb 19, 2021)

Caring1 said:


> So some "blonde" posts pics of machinery and water lines with ice on it as an explanation as to why gas lines are frozen?



Correct or not, what does the poster's physical appearance have to do with anything?


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## Caring1 (Feb 19, 2021)

80-watt Hamster said:


> Correct or not, what does the poster's physical appearance have to do with anything?


Nothing, just like her unqualified postings online.
She may as well have posted pictures of clouds and blamed them, or her cat maybe.


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## 80-watt Hamster (Feb 19, 2021)

Caring1 said:


> Nothing, just like her unqualified postings online.
> She may as well have posted pictures of clouds and blamed them, or her cat maybe.



Then address her position.  Calling her out based on being "blonde" just makes you look like a dick.


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## Slizzo (Feb 19, 2021)

80-watt Hamster said:


> Then address her position.  Calling her out based on being "blonde" just makes you look like a dick.


Sexist. Though also still a dick.


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## dragontamer5788 (Feb 19, 2021)

Caring1 said:


> So some "blonde" posts pics of machinery and water lines with ice on it as an explanation as to why gas lines are frozen?



As an explanation why Texas lost 30GWs of nuclear, gas, and coal power.

It turns out that those thermal power-plants need water to create steam, and steam to spin their generators. So yes: frozen above-grade uninsulated water pipes are a perfectly adequate explanation to the phenomenon that occurred this past week.


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## ThrashZone (Feb 19, 2021)

Hi,
Yeah bottom line nothing was winterized but the blame game continues


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## JustAnEngineer (Feb 19, 2021)

Here are the recommendations after the similar hard freeze in Texas in 2011:


			https://www.nerc.com/pa/rrm/ea/ColdWeatherTrainingMaterials/FERC%20NERC%20Findings%20and%20Recommendations.pdf
		

El Paso followed these recommendations.

Federal guidelines for power plant winterization were not applied within ERCOT:


			https://www.nerc.com/comm/OC_Reliability_Guidelines_DL/Reliability_Guideline_Generating_Unit_Winter_Weather_Readiness_v3_Final.pdf
		


Guidelines for assessing risks to the natural gas supply:


			https://www.nerc.com/comm/PC_Reliability_Guidelines_DL/Fuel_Assurance_and_Fuel-Related_Reliability_Risk_Analysis_for_the_Bulk_Power_System.pdf
		


Here's the report of the hard freeze across the southern U.S. three years ago:


			https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-07/SouthCentralUnitedStatesColdWeatherBulkElectricSystemEventofJanuary17-2018.pdf


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## Why_Me (Feb 19, 2021)

Fourstaff said:


> All it takes is a few instruments to freeze for the whole pipeline network to shut in due to safety concerns.
> 
> As for gas production, its regular practice for to inject MEG to fight hydrates forming here (ambient temps of 20-30C), I can imagine that there will be wells which will be unable to flow due to the low temps. Source: I work in E&P (aka oil/gas production).


If Alaska wells don't have a problem pushing up gas & oil at -50 I'm not sure why the wells in Texas can't do the same in temps that didn't hit below zero. Source: I spent nearly two decades working in the oil patch up on Alaska's north slope.

Shlumberger cleaning well heads in -30 temps. The rest of those well houses were online and pumping like they always do.


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## 80-watt Hamster (Feb 19, 2021)

I'm having a hard time figuring out what there truly is to argue about here.  Stuff worked before.  Then some of it stopped working when it got cold.  That means something was under-designed for cold weather operation (probably multiple somethings), or cold-sensitive critical components/systems weren't maintained properly, or both.  Said stuff works in other places when cold, so we can pretty confidently land on under-preparedness of some sort being the problem.

One could draw yet another analogy to cars.  In a deep cold snap, a certain number will fall prey to one or more of:  weak coolant, old battery, un-winterized fuel (for diesels), water (now ice) in fuel lines, and other issues I'm not thinking of.  Power generation has it's own temperature-related risks, which the rest of the US has very clearly managed.  Texas seems to be a slow learner in that regard.

On the subject of regulation (since it keeps getting brought up), it's not a bad thing in and of itself, but can be over-used like anything else.  One of the neat aspects of the US is how much room the states have to govern themselves.  That's a valuable and somewhat fragile thing; I feel we should be wary of how often blanket federal law is applied.  If Texas wants to structure their power grid to avoid federal standards, bully for them (I haven't corroborated this claim from earlier in the thread).  But then it's up to Texas to set and enforce its own standards and regs to avoid flusterclucks like this.


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## MikeSnow (Feb 19, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> That's a pic of a monitoring station .. all it does is monitor the gas so they know how much to charge (cubic ft.).  The gas line going into my cabin goes 3/4 of the way around the outside of this place and none of its insulated.  I've had -40 temps multiple times and have never had an issue.


In my experience, the critical things to protect are the diaphragm valves between the high pressure and low pressure parts of the system. My newly built apartment building had such a valve outside, at the base of the building, and the valve was not isolated properly. When the temperature outside went negative (in Celsius), the valve froze, and we remained without gas for a few days. After this incident, the entire thing was enveloped in glass wool, and we never had any more problems in the last 10 years.

Natural gas contains some amount of water vapor, and when the gas is converted from high pressure to low pressure, which happens at the level of the valve I talked about earlier, it cools down even further, which causes the water to freeze on the surfaces inside the valve. The higher the pressure difference, the more it cools when it passes through the valve. The gas being cold on the high pressure side exacerbates the problem. If the gas line you were talking about, going into your cabin, is low pressure, it's not a big deal if it's not isolated. But I bet the previous high pressure segment properly isolated, including the valve between it and the lower pressure segment.

You can read more about this here: https://welker.com/freeze-protectio...line-systems-and-measurement-instrumentation/


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## Caring1 (Feb 19, 2021)

Slizzo said:


> Sexist. Though also still a dick.


Please tell me how noting the colour of her hair is sexist?
it may be leaning towards a generalization, but it's not sexist.



dragontamer5788 said:


> It turns out that those thermal power-plants need water to create steam, and steam to spin their generators. So yes: frozen above-grade uninsulated water pipes are a perfectly adequate explanation to the phenomenon that occurred this past week.


Ahh yes, if only they had some thermal means of heating those pipes and or their own water retention system.
It's not like water is used to cool power plants.


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## Fourstaff (Feb 20, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> If Alaska wells don't have a problem pushing up gas & oil at -50 I'm not sure why the wells in Texas can't do the same in temps that didn't hit below zero. Source: I spent nearly two decades working in the oil patch up on Alaska's north slope.
> 
> Shlumberger cleaning well heads in -30 temps. The rest of those well houses were online and pumping like they always do.


North Slope wells are designed to produce under cold temps, I am pretty sure a lot of Texan ones are designed to curtail/defer during periods of bad weather. The same way how the DW gulf platforms are designed to shut in during hurricanes - its cheaper to shut in production than to install a weather proof piece of equipment which gets used once a decade.


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## Why_Me (Feb 20, 2021)

Fourstaff said:


> North Slope wells are designed to produce under cold temps, I am pretty sure a lot of Texan ones are designed to curtail/defer during periods of bad weather. The same way how the DW gulf platforms are designed to shut in during hurricanes - its cheaper to shut in production than to install a weather proof piece of equipment which gets used once a decade.


The only weather proof equipment in those well houses are the well houses themselves.  They're made out of sheet metal and each corner along with the roof is connected via a piece of angle iron.  Oil comes out of the ground at around 140F.


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## tfdsaf (Feb 20, 2021)

mechtech said:


> Interesting.  I never heard of windmills freezing up here in Canada.  Maybe we got the ‘winter’ grade?


You probably have redundant energy, there are always issues in any system, so you want to generally be producing more than what the consumption is, plus that way you also future proof for bigger population down the road in 20-30 years. I think Texas doesn't even achieve full coverage with its own electricity, so they import electricity from other states, not by much, probably just 2-4% to supplement theirs, which in cases like these really hurts you.

Generally you want 10% higher output than consumption, just in case.


----------



## Vayra86 (Feb 20, 2021)

Why_Me said:


> It's even more amusing that some people put so much faith into windmill farms.  Just ask the Germans who tout green energy yet are having the Russians build them a second gas line (Nordstream 2) but only after screwing the Hungarians for attempting to do the same (Southstream).
> 
> 
> Funny that seeing how the Dutch are knee deep with the Germans when it comes to importing Russian natural gas.  Natural gas is clean and easy hence the reason its the #1 source of energy for northern Europe, the US and Canada.
> ...



Its a definite choice of evils, but they all point to a singular problem: energy self sufficiency and the EU needs it much like its own production capacity.


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## Slizzo (Feb 22, 2021)

Caring1 said:


> Please tell me how noting the colour of her hair is sexist?
> it may be leaning towards a generalization, but it's not sexist.


It's entirely irrelevant to the conversation.


----------

