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On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can reacta lot >>> faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it
*didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is
converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase.
the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the
control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical
energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable
without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything. Stabilising the frequency is all
about feeding in more mechanical energy to compensate for the extra load.
You can feed in electrical energy from a battery quite a lot faster, and
get a correspondingly better result, if you've got the right elaborate control algorithm.
On 29/04/2025 22:33, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national
grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with
it. This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade
failure.
(total loss in the peninsula)
For those that can follow spoken Spanish, there has just been a
detailed explanation on Radio Cadena Ser. Aimar Bretos interviewed
Jorge Morales on Hora 25:
«Director of Próxima Energía and expert in the energy sector.
Entrepreneur and industrial engineer from the Polytechnic University
of Madrid, he has more than 20 years of experience in the Spanish
electricity sector.»
Hi Carlos,
For those of us that can't follow spoken Spanish at all please can you
precis what he said was the root cause of failure? Options seem to be:
1. France-Spain interconnect failure
2. Cyber attack
3. Human Error
4. Exceptionally "Rare" atmospheric phenomena
5. Flying pigs/unicorns [delete as appropriate]
6. Other
Reuters still hasn't picked up on it at all. Latest is here:
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/sanchez-pressed-explain-spains- blackout-grid-says-solar-not-blame-2025-04-30/
I'm not sure that I believe them.
I'd stand a bit more of a chance chance with a text based page.
Thanks.
On Tue, 29 Apr 2025 23:33:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
The Wall Street Journal just published an analysis. The authors are
Spanish.
How the Lights Went Out in Spain
The country flew too close to the sun — which is to say it relied too heavily on unreliable solar power.
The following link should not require a subscription.
.<https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-the-lights-went-out-in-spain-solar-power-electric-grid-0096bbc7?st=MbzSqb&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink>
Our garage doors roll up and over (i.e., move from the vertical
plane to the horizontal). So, with the door open, about half of the
ceiling is blocked (lights typically affixed to ceilings).
Same here but my garage or perhaps I should say workshop is a double garage front with room for 4 cars in theory. Realistically only room for one and there
is an inspection pit too although I have to syphon the water out of it before use. Water table is rather high round here.
Back half is workspace with a bench, big vice, press drill and a lathe.
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it. This
is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade failure.
On 5/1/25 12:04, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 01:36, Chris Jones wrote:
On 30/04/2025 1:07 am, Martin Brown wrote:
The idea that renewable sources make the grid frequency harder to
manage sounds like total nonsense.
It is pretty much accurate. The local feed in for domestic PV track
whatever frequency they see on the network. The big problem is that
without the large spinning generators and the energy stored in that
angular momentum the frequency is able to shift rather too quickly.
If the specifications for the inverters are written based on sound
engineering and simulation of the grid behaviour rather than fear and
ideology, it would be quite feasible to alter the algorithm in the PV
inverters to help stabilise the grid frequency. For example, you could
make it simulate what a spinning generator would do, or very likely
something much better.
I don't disagree that inverters at least on the bigger systems could be
made to behave a lot more like a system that has physical inertia.
I don't think it is viable for home units though since they are made
down to a price and the robustness needed to oppose a frequency drift is
not insignificant. They would be like a flea trying stop an elephant.
I don't agree here. Since the power injected into the grid by
large installations is regulated by looking at the frequency,
once the grid gets dominated by, say, solar PV power, they'd
better make sure it behaves the same way. Of course, any single
small unit can't have a noticable effect, but collectively,
they can!
Jeroen Belleman
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
On Tue, 29 Apr 2025 23:33:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid
yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it. This
is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade failure.
(total loss in the peninsula)
For those that can follow spoken Spanish, there has just been a detailed >>explanation on Radio Cadena Ser. Aimar Bretos interviewed Jorge Morales
on Hora 25:
«Director of Próxima Energía and expert in the energy sector. >>Entrepreneur and industrial engineer from the Polytechnic University of >>Madrid, he has more than 20 years of experience in the Spanish
electricity sector.»
Direct link to mp3, starting from 31:30
<https://25673.mc.tritondigital.com/HORA_25_CADENASER_320_P/media-session/9db9ab48-74f6-4fac-9b8f-ab24df840f9f/2025/4/29/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_210000_220000.mp3?dist=cadenaser-web-tfp-permanente&csegid=22000&dl=1>
and:
<https://25673.mc.tritondigital.com/HORA_25_CADENASER_320_P/media-session/a06f2199-cd2a-4ce5-8045-ba282565c2c0/2025/4/29/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_220000_230000.mp3?dist=cadenaser-web-tfp-permanente&csegid=22000&dl=1>
Or, if that fails:
<https://cadenaser.com/audio/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_210000_220000/?ssm=whatsapp>
Continues on
<https://cadenaser.com/audio/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_220000_230000/?ssm=whatsapp>
Waiting for the podcast to appear [...] got it.
<https://cadenaser.com/nacional/2025/04/29/se-puede-repetir-el-apagon-un-experto-responde-la-duda-tras-la-caida-de-la-red-electrica-cadena-ser/?ssm=whatsapp>
The Wall Street Journal just published an analysis. The authors are
Spanish.
How the Lights Went Out in Spain
The country flew too close to the sun ? which is to say it relied too
heavily on unreliable solar power.
The following link should not require a subscription.
.<https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-the-lights-went-out-in-spain-solar-power-electric-grid-0096bbc7?st=MbzSqb&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink>
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine is nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine
is nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
On 2025-04-30 23:28, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Tue, 29 Apr 2025 23:33:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
The Wall Street Journal just published an analysis. The authors are
Spanish.
How the Lights Went Out in Spain
The country flew too close to the sun ù which is to say it relied too
heavily on unreliable solar power.
The following link should not require a subscription.
.<https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-the-lights-went-out-in-spain-solar-power-electric-grid-0096bbc7?st=MbzSqb&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink>
I believe that one to be biased against renewable power.
Joe Gwinn <joegwinn@comcast.net> wrote:
On Tue, 29 Apr 2025 23:33:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid >>>> yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it. This >>>> is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade failure.
(total loss in the peninsula)
For those that can follow spoken Spanish, there has just been a detailed >>>explanation on Radio Cadena Ser. Aimar Bretos interviewed Jorge Morales >>>on Hora 25:
½Director of Pr≤xima Energøa and expert in the energy sector. >>>Entrepreneur and industrial engineer from the Polytechnic University of >>>Madrid, he has more than 20 years of experience in the Spanish >>>electricity sector.╗
Direct link to mp3, starting from 31:30
<https://25673.mc.tritondigital.com/HORA_25_CADENASER_320_P/media-session/9db9ab48-74f6-4fac-9b8f-ab24df840f9f/2025/4/29/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_210000_220000.mp3?dist=cadenaser-web-tfp-permanente&csegid=22000&dl=1>
and:
<https://25673.mc.tritondigital.com/HORA_25_CADENASER_320_P/media-session/a06f2199-cd2a-4ce5-8045-ba282565c2c0/2025/4/29/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_220000_230000.mp3?dist=cadenaser-web-tfp-permanente&csegid=22000&dl=1>
Or, if that fails:
<https://cadenaser.com/audio/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_210000_220000/?ssm=whatsapp>
Continues on
<https://cadenaser.com/audio/cadenaser_hora25_20250429_220000_230000/?ssm=whatsapp>
Waiting for the podcast to appear [...] got it.
<https://cadenaser.com/nacional/2025/04/29/se-puede-repetir-el-apagon-un-experto-responde-la-duda-tras-la-caida-de-la-red-electrica-cadena-ser/?ssm=whatsapp>
The Wall Street Journal just published an analysis. The authors are
Spanish.
How the Lights Went Out in Spain
The country flew too close to the sun ? which is to say it relied too
heavily on unreliable solar power.
The following link should not require a subscription.
.<https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-the-lights-went-out-in-spain-solar-power-electric-grid-0096bbc7?st=MbzSqb&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink>
Useless page:
: Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker
Am 01.05.25 um 23:28 schrieb Carlos E.R.:
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine is
nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
The induction oven in my kitchen can apply 7.5 KW to the 2 front plates
The back burners are OFF then. It's a good idea not to leave the kitchen when thusly used. A large pot with noodle water can change to a volcano
in no time. :-)
It is connected to the grid via 2 of the 3 phases of 240V. Dish washer,
hot water, washing machine.. are extra.
The house fuses are 3*50A @ 240V, not intended for replacement by customer. Nothing special here.
Now if one would switch from star to triangle config @ 400V ...
Car chargers might use that some day?
Cheers, Gerhard
I noted that some induction cooktops had design limitations
restricting how many "burners" could be active. One would have
hoped they would be able to time-division multiplex the
application of power to allow for all heat sources to be in use.
On 5/1/2025 2:28 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine
is nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
A smaller home may have a 60A service (~14KW). The 100A service
(24KW) tends to be the norm (in older developments). Newer homes
have 200A services (48KW).
We tend to be bigger energy consumers than the rest of the world
(i.e., "pigs").
On 2025-05-02 01:38, Don Y wrote:
I noted that some induction cooktops had design limitations
restricting how many "burners" could be active. One would have
hoped they would be able to time-division multiplex the
application of power to allow for all heat sources to be in use.
Some do. I have seen some stoves that limit the total load, and allow the user
to configure that limit. Not the number of burners.
On 2025-05-02 00:16, Don Y wrote:
On 5/1/2025 2:28 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine is >>> nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
A smaller home may have a 60A service (~14KW). The 100A service
(24KW) tends to be the norm (in older developments). Newer homes
have 200A services (48KW).
We tend to be bigger energy consumers than the rest of the world
(i.e., "pigs").
We can have as much as we want, as long as we pay. The monthly invoice has two
basic parts: a variable part, proportional to the watts we actually use, and a
fixed part, proportional to the maximum watts we contract to have. So if we say
we want a fuse of 25A on house input, we pay 25 times K, a constant in euros.
Thus it pays to have a small fuse. It is not a fuse, just a calibrated switch with a lead seal. Recently, it is some firmware in the smart meter.
I don't know the reasoning for this system, but the distribution company can thus calibrate the maximum power needed, different from the statistical max power. If the entire city maxes on power and it goes down, we can sue. We contracted and pay for the maximum on the entire network!
On Thu, 1 May 2025 22:12:21 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-04-30 23:28, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Tue, 29 Apr 2025 23:33:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
The Wall Street Journal just published an analysis. The authors are
Spanish.
How the Lights Went Out in Spain
The country flew too close to the sun — which is to say it relied too
heavily on unreliable solar power.
The following link should not require a subscription.
.<https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-the-lights-went-out-in-spain-solar-power-electric-grid-0096bbc7?st=MbzSqb&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink>
I believe that one to be biased against renewable power.
The WSJ is one of the main newspapers of the Finance world. The UK equivalent is the Financial Times, although FT's politics are closer
to the EU than the US.
Anyway, the Finance folk worry about profit and loss, and so are not
against renewable power per se.
What they are against is mandating and subsidizing: If X is such a
good idea, it will just take over naturally, without requiring
mandates and subsidies. So they will question X, whatever it happens
to be. Just stop all government actions there, and let the market
settle the issue.
Circling back, basically, the engineering numbers don't work. It's
easy to show that decarbonizing cannot work, as the total CO2 content
of the atmosphere is simply immense, and there is 50 times that much
stored in the ocean deeps. And China is building coal plants as fast
as they can, so we (US+UK+EU) are a roundoff error compared to China
et al.
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can
reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it
*didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is
converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase.
the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy
which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the
control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical
energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable
without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load;
increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the
load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts.
They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but it
can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter generate exactly the AC output that you need.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, but that's really all that it is good for.
On 2025-05-01 15:37, Bill Sloman wrote:
You can feed in electrical energy from a battery quite a lot faster,
and get a correspondingly better result, if you've got the right
elaborate control algorithm.
Wouldn't it be just easier to switch to DC?
Or to at least switch to islands, interconnected by DC.
Probably not practical by now.
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid
yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it.
This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade
failure.
I should say, although too late, that it should be "Gran Apagón" :-)
Am 01.05.25 um 23:28 schrieb Carlos E.R.:
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW. OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads. A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine
is nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW.
The induction oven in my kitchen can apply 7.5 KW to the 2 front plates
The back burners are OFF then. It's a good idea not to leave the kitchen
when thusly used. A large pot with noodle water can change to a volcano
in no time. :-)
It is connected to the grid via 2 of the 3 phases of 240V. Dish washer,
hot water, washing machine.. are extra.
The house fuses are 3*50A @ 240V, not intended for replacement by
customer. Nothing special here.
Now if one would switch from star to triangle config @ 400V ...
Car chargers might use that some day?
Cheers, Gerhard
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but
it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery.
The grid has adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well
understood.
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they
were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities.
It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough
at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off
and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Based on the time it went tits up it seems likely that it failed due to
too much power being forced into the network and not enough load of last resort or exports to France down the one puny cable they do have.
UK's intermittent loads of last resort are also diminishing as steel
works closed although it is never really sunny enough here to matter and
wind turbines can be easily feathered (and paid handsomely to do SFA).
There is really only the chloralkali plants at Runcorn left now.
Silly electricity prices based on the wholesale price for gas have
pretty much destroyed aluminium and steel making in the UK. Scotland has
a couple hanging on by their fingernails hoping for a reprieve.
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that
cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
On 5/1/25 4:06 AM, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/1/25 12:24, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia.á Not magic but physics.áá A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds.á Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
I'm convinced it's becoming necessary for small domestic systems
to servo the injected power to the grid frequency, just as is done
for large power plants. There is no need for massive storage; Each
contributes what he is able to. I *do* think the dP/dF will need to
be adjusted by some central authority to keep a stable system.
Jeroen Belleman
In California and many other states it is required that residential
solar inverters adhere to Rule 21 (aka UL 1741).
They have some simple rules that are intended to stabilize the grid
where there are significant amounts of solar power.
Below 60Hz and 245V the inverters are not restricted but as the
frequency or voltage rises above the thresholds the inverters will
curtail their output.
As there is no energy storage in the inverters it is not possible to go >further and take power from the grid.
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that
cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:37:46 -0700, KevinJ93 <kevin_es@whitedigs.com>
wrote:
On 5/1/25 4:06 AM, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/1/25 12:24, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>>>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn >>>> on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
I'm convinced it's becoming necessary for small domestic systems
to servo the injected power to the grid frequency, just as is done
for large power plants. There is no need for massive storage; Each
contributes what he is able to. I *do* think the dP/dF will need to
be adjusted by some central authority to keep a stable system.
Jeroen Belleman
In California and many other states it is required that residential
solar inverters adhere to Rule 21 (aka UL 1741).
They have some simple rules that are intended to stabilize the grid
where there are significant amounts of solar power.
Below 60Hz and 245V the inverters are not restricted but as the
frequency or voltage rises above the thresholds the inverters will
curtail their output.
As there is no energy storage in the inverters it is not possible to go
further and take power from the grid.
Just pump it back into the solar cells. Return it to the sun.
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that
cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
On 2025-05-02 00:16, Don Y wrote:
On 5/1/2025 2:28 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-30 11:57, Don Y wrote:A smaller home may have a 60A service (~14KW).á The 100A service
A *small* "whole home" generator is about 14KW.á OK if you are
careful with your sequencing loads.á A normal home service is 24KW.
A typical home in Spain (a flat) is typically limited to 3.45 KW. Mine
is nominally limited to 2.3 Kw. Affluent or bigger homes could be 5.75KW. >>
(24KW) tends to be the norm (in older developments).á Newer homes
have 200A services (48KW).
We tend to be bigger energy consumers than the rest of the world
(i.e., "pigs").
We can have as much as we want, as long as we pay. The monthly invoice
has two basic parts: a variable part, proportional to the watts we
actually use, and a fixed part, proportional to the maximum watts we
contract to have. So if we say we want a fuse of 25A on house input, we
pay 25 times K, a constant in euros.
Thus it pays to have a small fuse. It is not a fuse, just a calibrated
switch with a lead seal. Recently, it is some firmware in the smart meter.
I don't know the reasoning for this system, but the distribution company
can thus calibrate the maximum power needed, different from the
statistical max power. If the entire city maxes on power and it goes
down, we can sue. We contracted and pay for the maximum on the entire >network!
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >> >>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
They have no problem at a few cycles per second, as London Transport >discovered in the early days of computers.
London Transport was powered by Lotts Road Power Station. The load was >mainly underground electric railways, trams and trolleybuses. but they
took the electricity supply for their offices from there too. The first >computer they installed kept crashing and the problem was traced to dips
in the power supply rails.
After a lot of investigation, they discovered that the AC mains supply
had alternate (or perhaps every third) cycles much lower in voltage than
the others (and I think there must have been a timing error too). The
power supply smoothing capacitors were unable to store enough energy to
tide them over the dips and the result was a regular dropping of the >'stabilised' supply rails.
The fault was traced back to Lotts Road, where it was found that a steam >valve was constantly cycling due to an unstable control loop. This
hadn't had any effect on the trams, so nobody had bothered to do
anything about it.
Conclusion:
A tram stores more energy than a computer capacitor bank.
On 01/05/2025 20:50, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-01 15:37, Bill Sloman wrote:
You can feed in electrical energy from a battery quite a lot faster,
and get a correspondingly better result, if you've got the right
elaborate control algorithm.
Wouldn't it be just easier to switch to DC?
Some of the newer interconnectors are DC and GW capacity (boggle).
Or to at least switch to islands, interconnected by DC.
That was how they squared this circle in Japan where the NE are on UK
mains at 50Hz and the SE are on US mains at 60Hz. Not surprisingly all Japanese kit will work quite happily at either frequency and their
exports will also work on a huge voltage range too.
There is quite an interesting magnetic deviation near big DC links.
Probably not practical by now.
No it is perfectly possible. I'm not sure how they do it.
One of my mates worked on the civil engineering for the DC link in the
Irish Sea. This Ireland to UK is 500MW.
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/04/18/irish-uk-grids-linked-via-500-mw- greenlink-interconnector-subsea-cables/
ISTR there is a N-S one in the Irish Sea rated at ~2GW and two more
planned for the North Sea although the pylon routing for them on land
has proved extremely controversial. Southern Nimby's want our northern electricity but they don't want any pylons blighting *their* landscape.
On 5/1/2025 5:56 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-02 01:38, Don Y wrote:
I noted that some induction cooktops had design limitations
restricting how many "burners" could be active. One would have
hoped they would be able to time-division multiplex the
application of power to allow for all heat sources to be in use.
Some do. I have seen some stoves that limit the total load, and allow
the user to configure that limit. Not the number of burners.
I was under the impression (without investigating) that some
key bit of electronics was multiplexed between the burners,
based on actual usage.
Here, we often use the entire stovetop (4 burners plus warmer)
AND have something in at least one of the ovens. I have assumed
that the software "schedules" power distribution to meet the
current (no pun) demands placed on the appliance.
It would be interesting to test that limit and see if the
stove is aware of it and what (if anything) it does to
convey that limitation to us!
On 01/05/2025 21:13, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national
grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with
it. This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade
failure.
I should say, although too late, that it should be "Gran Apagón" :-)
Sorry about that. I remember the phrase from my astronomy days when the
Gran Canary were persuaded to go completely dark for one night only so
that the Isaac Newton telescope on its peak could do something special.
It gave everyone there an opportunity to see a truly dark sky.
Links to it back in 1985 are now very thin on the ground. An article celebrating 10th anniversary is the best I can find in English page 31. (sorry its very big)
On 2025-05-02 12:17, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 20:50, Carlos E.R. wrote:
Wouldn't it be just easier to switch to DC?
Some of the newer interconnectors are DC and GW capacity (boggle).
Or to at least switch to islands, interconnected by DC.
That was how they squared this circle in Japan where the NE are on UK
mains at 50Hz and the SE are on US mains at 60Hz. Not surprisingly all
Japanese kit will work quite happily at either frequency and their
exports will also work on a huge voltage range too.
There is quite an interesting magnetic deviation near big DC links.
I learned today that we can not isolate islands inside the country,
because there are regions with a lot of demand and little generation,
and other regions with a lot of generation and little demand. To do that would require separate transport.
Probably not practical by now.
No it is perfectly possible. I'm not sure how they do it.
One of my mates worked on the civil engineering for the DC link in the
Irish Sea. This Ireland to UK is 500MW.
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/04/18/irish-uk-grids-linked-via-500-mw- greenlink-interconnector-subsea-cables/
ISTR there is a N-S one in the Irish Sea rated at ~2GW and two more
planned for the North Sea although the pylon routing for them on land
has proved extremely controversial. Southern Nimby's want our northern
electricity but they don't want any pylons blighting *their* landscape.
Ah, yes, that happens.
On Fri, 2 May 2025 17:49:48 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>> >>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn >>> >> on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
They have no problem at a few cycles per second, as London Transport >>discovered in the early days of computers.
London Transport was powered by Lotts Road Power Station. The load was >>mainly underground electric railways, trams and trolleybuses. but they
took the electricity supply for their offices from there too. The first >>computer they installed kept crashing and the problem was traced to dips
in the power supply rails.
After a lot of investigation, they discovered that the AC mains supply
had alternate (or perhaps every third) cycles much lower in voltage than >>the others (and I think there must have been a timing error too). The >>power supply smoothing capacitors were unable to store enough energy to >>tide them over the dips and the result was a regular dropping of the >>'stabilised' supply rails.
The fault was traced back to Lotts Road, where it was found that a steam >>valve was constantly cycling due to an unstable control loop. This
hadn't had any effect on the trams, so nobody had bothered to do
anything about it.
Conclusion:
A tram stores more energy than a computer capacitor bank.
I used to design steamship throttle and boiler control systems [1]. A >steamship throttle valve hydraulic actuator is powered by low pressure
oil (from a standby gravity tank) and slews in a few seconds. But
serious high-pressure hydraulic actuators have multi-horsepower
outputs and bandwidths of hundreds of Hz.
A decent steam valve will nicely overlap the equivalent bandwidth of a
big generator's inertia. Field control can be made fast too.
Control engineers would be better at desiging stable power systems
than greenie politicians.
[1] Big ships are mostly diesels now.
I was once stranded dead in the water in the Gulf Of Mexico/America,
with maybe 100 other guys, on a LASH ship sea trial, when the main
turbine steam valve actuator locked up and had to be disassembled and >redesigned.
On 2025-05-02 03:40, Don Y wrote:
On 5/1/2025 5:56 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-02 01:38, Don Y wrote:
I noted that some induction cooktops had design limitations
restricting how many "burners" could be active. One would have
hoped they would be able to time-division multiplex the
application of power to allow for all heat sources to be in use.
Some do. I have seen some stoves that limit the total load, and allow the >>> user to configure that limit. Not the number of burners.
I was under the impression (without investigating) that some
key bit of electronics was multiplexed between the burners,
based on actual usage.
They convert the input AC to DC. That part can be shared.
Here, we often use the entire stovetop (4 burners plus warmer)
AND have something in at least one of the ovens. I have assumed
that the software "schedules" power distribution to meet the
current (no pun) demands placed on the appliance.
It would be interesting to test that limit and see if the
stove is aware of it and what (if anything) it does to
convey that limitation to us!
In my case, I have to be aware of everything that is using electricity in the house, and then select the power at the burner, and whether I can use both or not, or the microwave simultaneously.
If I hit the limit, the electricity to the house is cut off, and the procedure
to restore is a bit cumbersome.
So far, I have never hit the limit.
I learned today that we can not isolate islands inside the country, because there are regions with a lot of demand and little generation, and other regions
with a lot of generation and little demand. To do that would require separate transport.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:45 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:37:46 -0700, KevinJ93 <kevin_es@whitedigs.com>
wrote:
On 5/1/25 4:06 AM, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/1/25 12:24, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that
cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia.  Not magic but physics.   A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds.  Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
I'm convinced it's becoming necessary for small domestic systems
to servo the injected power to the grid frequency, just as is done
for large power plants. There is no need for massive storage; Each
contributes what he is able to. I *do* think the dP/dF will need to
be adjusted by some central authority to keep a stable system.
Jeroen Belleman
In California and many other states it is required that residential
solar inverters adhere to Rule 21 (aka UL 1741).
They have some simple rules that are intended to stabilize the grid
where there are significant amounts of solar power.
Below 60Hz and 245V the inverters are not restricted but as the
frequency or voltage rises above the thresholds the inverters will
curtail their output.
As there is no energy storage in the inverters it is not possible to go >> >> further and take power from the grid.
Just pump it back into the solar cells. Return it to the sun.
Light-emitting diodes do act as rather ineffective photocells. I'm not
sure that solar cells are much good as light-emitting diodes. They
certainly won't be narrow angle emitters, so the sun wouldn't get much
benefit out of it.
They would probably light up brightly for a very short while if you
pumped enough power into them.
On Fri, 2 May 2025 17:49:48 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>>>>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn >>>>> on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
They have no problem at a few cycles per second, as London Transport
discovered in the early days of computers.
London Transport was powered by Lotts Road Power Station. The load was
mainly underground electric railways, trams and trolleybuses. but they
took the electricity supply for their offices from there too. The first
computer they installed kept crashing and the problem was traced to dips
in the power supply rails.
After a lot of investigation, they discovered that the AC mains supply
had alternate (or perhaps every third) cycles much lower in voltage than
the others (and I think there must have been a timing error too). The
power supply smoothing capacitors were unable to store enough energy to
tide them over the dips and the result was a regular dropping of the
'stabilised' supply rails.
The fault was traced back to Lotts Road, where it was found that a steam
valve was constantly cycling due to an unstable control loop. This
hadn't had any effect on the trams, so nobody had bothered to do
anything about it.
Conclusion:
A tram stores more energy than a computer capacitor bank.
I used to design steamship throttle and boiler control systems [1]. A steamship throttle valve hydraulic actuator is powered by low pressure
oil (from a standby gravity tank) and slews in a few seconds. But
serious high-pressure hydraulic actuators have multi-horsepower
outputs and bandwidths of hundreds of Hz.
A decent steam valve will nicely overlap the equivalent bandwidth of a
big generator's inertia. Field control can be made fast too.
Control engineers would be better at designing stable power systems
than greenie politicians.
[1] Big ships are mostly diesels now.
I was once stranded dead in the water in the Gulf Of Mexico/America,
with maybe 100 other guys, on a LASH ship sea trial, when the main
turbine steam valve actuator locked up and had to be disassembled and redesigned.
On Fri, 2 May 2025 17:49:47 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:45 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:37:46 -0700, KevinJ93 <kevin_es@whitedigs.com>
wrote:
On 5/1/25 4:06 AM, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/1/25 12:24, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that
cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics.  A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive >>>>>>> energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
I'm convinced it's becoming necessary for small domestic systems
to servo the injected power to the grid frequency, just as is done >>>>>> for large power plants. There is no need for massive storage; Each >>>>>> contributes what he is able to. I *do* think the dP/dF will need to >>>>>> be adjusted by some central authority to keep a stable system.
Jeroen Belleman
In California and many other states it is required that residential
solar inverters adhere to Rule 21 (aka UL 1741).
They have some simple rules that are intended to stabilize the grid
where there are significant amounts of solar power.
Below 60Hz and 245V the inverters are not restricted but as the
frequency or voltage rises above the thresholds the inverters will
curtail their output.
As there is no energy storage in the inverters it is not possible to go >>>>> further and take power from the grid.
Just pump it back into the solar cells. Return it to the sun.
Light-emitting diodes do act as rather ineffective photocells. I'm not
sure that solar cells are much good as light-emitting diodes. They
certainly won't be narrow angle emitters, so the sun wouldn't get much
benefit out of it.
They would probably light up brightly for a very short while if you
pumped enough power into them.
I'd imagine that 10 or so square meters of PN diodes, out in the fresh
air, could dissipate a bunch of power. Certainly more than the panel
usually generates.
The controllers just aren't set up to work in that direction, nor is
there usually a way to tell them to.
Rooftop solar is kind of silly.
On Fri, 02 May 2025 13:41:07 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
wrote:
On Fri, 2 May 2025 17:49:48 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>>>>>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn >>>>>> on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive >>>>>> energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
They have no problem at a few cycles per second, as London Transport
discovered in the early days of computers.
London Transport was powered by Lotts Road Power Station. The load was
mainly underground electric railways, trams and trolleybuses. but they
took the electricity supply for their offices from there too. The first >>> computer they installed kept crashing and the problem was traced to dips >>> in the power supply rails.
After a lot of investigation, they discovered that the AC mains supply
had alternate (or perhaps every third) cycles much lower in voltage than >>> the others (and I think there must have been a timing error too). The
power supply smoothing capacitors were unable to store enough energy to
tide them over the dips and the result was a regular dropping of the
'stabilised' supply rails.
The fault was traced back to Lotts Road, where it was found that a steam >>> valve was constantly cycling due to an unstable control loop. This
hadn't had any effect on the trams, so nobody had bothered to do
anything about it.
Conclusion:
A tram stores more energy than a computer capacitor bank.
I used to design steamship throttle and boiler control systems [1]. A
steamship throttle valve hydraulic actuator is powered by low pressure
oil (from a standby gravity tank) and slews in a few seconds. But
serious high-pressure hydraulic actuators have multi-horsepower
outputs and bandwidths of hundreds of Hz.
A decent steam valve will nicely overlap the equivalent bandwidth of a
big generator's inertia. Field control can be made fast too.
Control engineers would be better at desiging stable power systems
than greenie politicians.
[1] Big ships are mostly diesels now.
I was once stranded dead in the water in the Gulf Of Mexico/America,
with maybe 100 other guys, on a LASH ship sea trial, when the main
turbine steam valve actuator locked up and had to be disassembled and
redesigned.
Of course a big generator can't sink power. If a few million people
are incentivized to have rooftop solar and to get paid to push it back
into the grid, and there's no way to stop them, things will get bad on
a sunny afternoon.
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:37:46 -0700, KevinJ93 <kevin_es@whitedigs.com>
wrote:
On 5/1/25 4:06 AM, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/1/25 12:24, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >>>>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn >>>> on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
I'm convinced it's becoming necessary for small domestic systems
to servo the injected power to the grid frequency, just as is done
for large power plants. There is no need for massive storage; Each
contributes what he is able to. I *do* think the dP/dF will need to
be adjusted by some central authority to keep a stable system.
Jeroen Belleman
In California and many other states it is required that residential
solar inverters adhere to Rule 21 (aka UL 1741).
They have some simple rules that are intended to stabilize the grid
where there are significant amounts of solar power.
Below 60Hz and 245V the inverters are not restricted but as the
frequency or voltage rises above the thresholds the inverters will
curtail their output.
As there is no energy storage in the inverters it is not possible to go
further and take power from the grid.
Just pump it back into the solar cells. Return it to the sun.
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can
reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy
which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the
control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load;
increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the
load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts.
They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but
it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood.
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they
were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities.
It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough
at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off
and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Based on the time it went tits up it seems likely that it failed due to
too much power being forced into the network and not enough load of last resort or exports to France down the one puny cable they do have.
UK's intermittent loads of last resort are also diminishing as steel
works closed although it is never really sunny enough here to matter and
wind turbines can be easily feathered (and paid handsomely to do SFA).
There is really only the chloralkali plants at Runcorn left now.
Silly electricity prices based on the wholesale price for gas have
pretty much destroyed aluminium and steel making in the UK. Scotland has
a couple hanging on by their fingernails hoping for a reprieve.
On 5/2/2025 2:24 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I learned today that we can not isolate islands inside the country,
because there are regions with a lot of demand and little generation,
and other regions with a lot of generation and little demand. To do
that would require separate transport.
Is there are practical reason why there is not enough (none?)
generation in those areas? Or, have they just not made the
investment?
I.e., is there anything preventing them from FIXING this imbalance?
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can
reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>> the frequency.á This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts.
They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but
it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a
flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood.
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they
were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities.
It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement
inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough
at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off
and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverter that forces the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can
reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>>>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but
it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a
flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood.
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they
were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement
inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough
at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off
and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
I.e., is there anything preventing them from FIXING this imbalance?
In Andalucia and Extremadura (south and west of Spain) there are lots of rural
areas that can accommodate huge solar plants, so lot of generation. On the other hand they don't have much of industry (not traditionally developed areas), so not much of demand (relatively).
On the other hand, Madrid (centre of Spain) and Cataluña (north-east) have a lot of industries and less solar/wind generation.
Nuclear generators are also mostly in the periphery, near the sea or big
rivers. Not in the very densely populated Madrid (map here: <https://www.miteco.gob.es/es/energia/nuclear/centrales/espana.html>).
Gas or oil generators? Also they don't abound in Madrid, the fuel has to be transported there.
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>> the frequency.á This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>>>>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
To have a bit of margin to regulate, PV installations will have
to either run somewhat below the bleeding edge, or to store a bit
of energy in local batteries.
Jeroen Belleman
On 29/04/2025 18:52, Don Y wrote:
On 4/29/2025 8:07 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
They try very hard not to mention the fact that their load shedding
algorithm was shedding a lot of local solar PV generation along with
the load so that it was playing catch up and never quite getting there.
Can they disconnect individual residential installations?
In principle they can disconnect any residential installation with a
smart meter (although they are normally prohibited from doing so). And
anyone with a SMETS1 "smart" meter is wide open for a bad actor to flip
their power on and off deliberately to bring the UK network down.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22608085
Unclear if the smart meters from that era that have become disabled by
the customer changing supplier are still a hacker security risk or not.
State actors would have no trouble hacking them...
Some university researchers had no real bother!
Or, just solar "farms"?
They can drop out entire blocks of switchgear to take a given region or
zone offline (as would happen if a fault condition trips a breaker).
The big problem on a really sunny day is that an individual house roof
4kW PV installation in late afternoon in the UK will be potentially
exporting all of it to the grid. That is about 20-30 houses worth of electricity for each solar roof.
They drop say 100MW of load or approx 500k houses @ 200W but with 2% of
them generating 4kW then they also drop off 40MW of local generation.
So the net load shedding is only 60MW which isn't enough to restore the balance and then the cycle repeats until it hits the low frequency total panic limiter. UK stopped it spreading by manual override dropping more
than the algorithm wanted but leaving a big area without power.
It didn't help that by the time they did that the low frequency had put
a lot of electric trains into a disabled state requiring a hard reset by
a qualified service engineer visit and at random positions on the
intercity train lines. The guys who could do that were in short supply.
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
To have a bit of margin to regulate, PV installations will have
to either run somewhat below the bleeding edge, or to store a bit
of energy in local batteries.
Jeroen Belleman
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid. And a
lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis that
needs reserve.
On 5/3/25 20:30, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter >>>>>>> generate exactly the AC output that you need.
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it
*didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase.
the frequency.á This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical
energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable
without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the
load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source. >>>>>>>
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
To have a bit of margin to regulate, PV installations will have
to either run somewhat below the bleeding edge, or to store a bit
of energy in local batteries.
Jeroen Belleman
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid. And a
lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis that
needs reserve.
With the contribution of solar and wind being oblivious of demand,
the burden of keeping the grid stable must be taken up by thermal
or hydro power plants. When Spain's grid crashed, PV amounted to
well over 50% of the total supply. It makes me wonder why it didn't
crash sooner.
Jeroen Belleman
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can
reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>>>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but
it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a
flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood.
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they
were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement
inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough
at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off
and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
But, you can set up smaller PV installations (hundreds of panels)
on commercial buildings, "cover" parking areas, etc. You don't
get the same economies of scale as you would with 1,000 panels
but 100+ panels on every city block makes a lot of power available
where it is used.
There is a regulation that says that every building will have to install some solar panels. I don't know when is the limit.
I suspect the pain hasn't been great enough to force them to
take their medicine?
Sorry, I don't understand this sentence. :-?
I.e., is there anything preventing them from FIXING this imbalance?
In Andalucia and Extremadura (south and west of Spain) there are lots
of rural areas that can accommodate huge solar plants, so lot of
generation. On the other hand they don't have much of industry (not
traditionally developed areas), so not much of demand (relatively).
Understandable. This seems to mirror the situation Martin has mentioned
in the UK (generation to the north, consumption in the south)
On the other hand, Madrid (centre of Spain) and Cataluña (north-east)
have a lot of industries and less solar/wind generation.
Nuclear generators are also mostly in the periphery, near the sea or big
For cooling.
rivers. Not in the very densely populated Madrid (map here: <https://
www.miteco.gob.es/es/energia/nuclear/centrales/espana.html>).
Gas or oil generators? Also they don't abound in Madrid, the fuel has
to be transported there.
But, you can set up smaller PV installations (hundreds of panels)
on commercial buildings, "cover" parking areas, etc. You don't
get the same economies of scale as you would with 1,000 panels
but 100+ panels on every city block makes a lot of power available
where it is used.
I suspect the pain hasn't been great enough to force them to
take their medicine?
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>> the frequency.á This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical >>>>>> regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
On 5/3/2025 2:59 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
But, you can set up smaller PV installations (hundreds of panels)
on commercial buildings, "cover" parking areas, etc. You don't
get the same economies of scale as you would with 1,000 panels
but 100+ panels on every city block makes a lot of power available
where it is used.
There is a regulation that says that every building will have to
install some solar panels. I don't know when is the limit.
I suspect the pain hasn't been great enough to force them to
take their medicine?
Sorry, I don't understand this sentence. :-?
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for them
to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an entire nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
On 30/04/2025 1:07 am, Martin Brown wrote:
The idea that renewable sources make the grid frequency harder to
manage sounds like total nonsense.
It is pretty much accurate. The local feed in for domestic PV track
whatever frequency they see on the network. The big problem is that
without the large spinning generators and the energy stored in that
angular momentum the frequency is able to shift rather too quickly.
The problems are largely self-inflicted (or self-fulfilling prophecies) created by those who fear allowing renewables on the grid. In Australia
they were so fearful of solar power being fed into the grid under
unusual circumstances like islanding, thay they set a very tight limit requiring the solar inverters to shut down if the frequency dips
slightly below nominal. So, once lots of PV was installed, when a coal-
fired generator fails and the frequency dips, some "dangerous" PV power
shuts down too, causing the problem to get worse, "just to be safe". It
isn't an inherent weakness of the technology, it is a direct consequance
of regulations written by those who fear or oppose renewables.
Fortunately this particular problem was recognised and new inverters are
now no longer required to shut down when the frequency dips within the foreseeable range.
If the specifications for the inverters are written based on sound engineering and simulation of the grid behaviour rather than fear and ideology, it would be quite feasible to alter the algorithm in the PV inverters to help stabilise the grid frequency. For example, you could
make it simulate what a spinning generator would do, or very likely
something much better.
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter that synthesises the same waveform and produces it with power semiconductors instead of a steam
engine. Especially domestic single-phase inverters already incorporate
enough capacitance to buffer the PV energy supplied to them, so as to
supply a sinusoidal current to the grid, and this storage allows it to
shift the phase of the current relative to the voltage however required
in order to help stabilise the system, if only it were allowed to and required to by regulations.
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for them
to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an entire
nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
Too early. It will be months before we know what actually happened, and this before anybody can think what can be done about it.
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for them >>> to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an entire >>> nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
Too early. It will be months before we know what actually happened,
and this before anybody can think what can be done about it.
But, they will now not be able to hand-wave the issue aside.
People will be EXPECTING "something" to be done with the
CLAIMED point of being a "solution". Even if it proves not to be!
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
On 5/3/25 20:30, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid. And a
lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis that
needs reserve.
With the contribution of solar and wind being oblivious of demand,
the burden of keeping the grid stable must be taken up by thermal
or hydro power plants.
When Spain's grid crashed, PV amounted to
well over 50% of the total supply. It makes me wonder why it didn't
crash sooner.
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>>>> the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>>>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
To have a bit of margin to regulate, PV installations will have
to either run somewhat below the bleeding edge, or to store a bit
of energy in local batteries.
Jeroen Belleman
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid.
And a lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis
that needs reserve.
It doesn't make sense to me for a multi-country grid to depend on "a
bit of energy stored" in household batteries and inverters for
emergency reserve power.
As the grids get greener, expect power to get less reliable and much
more expensive. Hopefully the USA will use more NG, build more
pipelines, and drill, baby, drill.
On 2025-05-04 00:15, Don Y wrote:
On 5/3/2025 2:59 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
But, you can set up smaller PV installations (hundreds of panels)
on commercial buildings, "cover" parking areas, etc. You don't
get the same economies of scale as you would with 1,000 panels
but 100+ panels on every city block makes a lot of power available
where it is used.
There is a regulation that says that every building will have to
install some solar panels. I don't know when is the limit.
I suspect the pain hasn't been great enough to force them to
take their medicine?
Sorry, I don't understand this sentence. :-?
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for them
to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an entire
nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
Too early. It will be months before we know what actually happened, and
this before anybody can think what can be done about it.
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it >>>>>>> *didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is >>>>>>> converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase. >>>>>>> the frequency.  This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the
turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical >>>>>>> energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable >>>>>>> without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load; >>>>> increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the >>>>> load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source.
So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter
generate exactly the AC output that you need.
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has
adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky
inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities. >>> It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists,
but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water.
Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that
this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water
pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid,
with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
On 4/05/2025 2:49 pm, Don Y wrote:
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for
them
to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an
entire
nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
Too early. It will be months before we know what actually happened,
and this before anybody can think what can be done about it.
But, they will now not be able to hand-wave the issue aside.
People will be EXPECTING "something" to be done with the
CLAIMED point of being a "solution". Even if it proves not to be!
Donald Trump has a lot of "solutions" to the "problems" he claims
American is facing. Hitler's solutions to similar "problems" was to
invade Russia. Trump's trade war with China is even more foolish.
Encouraging politicians to "act" often has them picking "solutions" that
look dramatic but don't actually work.
Buying lots of grid scale batteries probably would solve the problem,
but might not provide enough photo-opportunities to be an attractive solution. Pumped hydroelectric storage takes a lot longer to install but
it does offer more dramatic images.
On 4/05/2025 5:17 am, Jeroen Belleman wrote:
On 5/3/25 20:30, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
<snip>
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid. And a
lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis that
needs reserve.
With the contribution of solar and wind being oblivious of demand,
the burden of keeping the grid stable must be taken up by thermal
or hydro power plants.
The contributions of wind and solar don't have to be oblivious of demand
- wind turbines can be feathered and photovoltaic cells can be run at
higher voltages and lower currents than would give maximum power transfer.
In fact when you have a variable generating capacity, you need short
term storage to smooth it out. Pumped hydroelectric storage has been
around for decades now, and grid scale batteries are becoming popular.
though the South Australian Hornsdale Reserve was the first one
installed back in 2017.
When Spain's grid crashed, PV amounted to
well over 50% of the total supply. It makes me wonder why it didn't
crash sooner.
It make me wonder why they didn't have any grid scale scale storage. Bureaucrats are averse to innovation, but they shouldn't be quite that ignorant. Carlos says that some of the Spanish island communities
already have grid scale batteries - so it looks like bureaucratic inertia.
On 04/05/2025 01:27, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, >>>>>> with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of a
hat if the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled down
by the load.
I suspect from the time of day when this happened it was over supply of
solar PV leading to too high a frequency and/or over voltage events that
led to the cascade failure. Unclear why it didn't pass through a stable
state where supply matched demand though if that really was the case.
I suspect poor network stability analysis played a large part and the
network was still relying on the intrinsic stability of the old turbine generators that were no longer present. Have to wait for the report.
On 04/05/2025 01:27, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, >>>>>> with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of a
hat if the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled down
by the load. It can be done but the engineering will be interesting.
I suspect from the time of day when this happened it was over supply of
solar PV leading to too high a frequency and/or over voltage events that
led to the cascade failure. Unclear why it didn't pass through a stable
state where supply matched demand though if that really was the case.
I suspect poor network stability analysis played a large part and the
network was still relying on the intrinsic stability of the old turbine >generators that were no longer present. Have to wait for the report.
ISTR the electricity supplier in Spain has been warning about this for a >while but the politicians were not listening. I wonder if the Spanish >government *will* actually publish the results of the investigation.
On 5/4/25 02:29, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 00:15, Don Y wrote:
On 5/3/2025 2:59 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
But, you can set up smaller PV installations (hundreds of panels)
on commercial buildings, "cover" parking areas, etc. You don't
get the same economies of scale as you would with 1,000 panels
but 100+ panels on every city block makes a lot of power available
where it is used.
There is a regulation that says that every building will have to
install some solar panels. I don't know when is the limit.
I suspect the pain hasn't been great enough to force them to
take their medicine?
Sorry, I don't understand this sentence. :-?
Their "poor planning/engineering" hasn't COST them sufficiently for them >>> to actually DO something about the problem! Perhaps now, with an entire >>> nation *pissed*, they will decide they can't just wave their hands
at the problem...
Too early. It will be months before we know what actually happened,
and this before anybody can think what can be done about it.
I have this suspicion that power engineers know very well what
happened. Nobody wants to be the person to tell, because anyone
who does will be the scapegoat. Spain's politicians were very
clear: They are looking for someone to punish.
On Thu, 1 May 2025 15:48:45 +0100, Martin Brown
<'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
On 01/05/2025 15:06, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 10:27:36 +0100, Martin Brown
<'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
I hadn't realised that the French government have deliberately limited >>>> 400kV link capacity over the Pyrenees to protect EDF nuclear power from >>>> cheaper competition from Spain's massive solar PV investment.
One consequence of using a lot of solar power is that interconnected
networks get bigger hence less stable.
There is no reason why a larger network should be less stable - if
anything it should become more stable the more kit attached to it.
The only caveat is when the magentosphere goes haywire like in the
Carrington Event of 1859 and then long wires at high latitudes like in
Canada can get fried. That is a realistic mode of failure for our very
electricity focussed world. GPS going bad will also cause chaos.
Big transformers have *very* long lead times.
And are easily damaged. I wonder if an electronic version will ever be
a replacement for tons of steel and copper and oil. They could be
modular, like big RF transmitters are now. Lower voltage would help,
namely more regional power generation. In other words, pump gas and
not electricity. Gas pipelines store lots of energy; electric lines
don't.
A lot of mid-sized natural gas power plants (or, eventually, small
nukes) would allow regions to be independent when they have to be.
The networks have been continent wide for long while now. The newer
national interconnectors and offshore long distance lines are DC now!
Seems like stability is getting worse.
There are schemes to build vast solar arrays in Morroco (pretty good
location for them) with DC links into Europe and even to the UK!
Cool. One dragged anchor, or a bomb planted by a robot sub, could make
Europe go dark.
Tesla must be turning in his grave.
(presumably at 60Hz since he was American).
Installing solar PV in the UK is highly profitable but a wasted
opportunity since at our high latitude there really is no huge aircon
peak in the mid summer afternoons and we get too much cloud.
It is a double benefit in a lower latitude country to have solar panels
on the roof since it shades the roof from direct sunlight slowing heat
ingress and provided power as well.
Residential rooftop solar all over Morroco, to be collected and
exported to europe? Interesting concept.
Sun barely makes it above the horizon in the UK for 5 hours in midSolar electricity or water heating makes no sense in San Francisco
winter if it isn't cloudy. Solar powered "smart" road signs invariably
fail on frosty winters mornings. Ironically they say "please slow for
the dangerous bend ahead" - they work fine in mid summer but in mid
winter they wreck their batteries. Guess when there is ice on the road. >
either, but people get big subsidies so many do it. It complicates
roof repairs.
On 5/4/25 10:49, Martin Brown wrote:
On 04/05/2025 01:27, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of >>>>>>> inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the
grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie, >>>>>>> simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of
a hat if the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled
down by the load.
Not really. It should have a few percent of margin to increase
power delivered when the frequency drops. The point is that the
mains grid is composed of many generators. This only works if they
take collective action. The European grid collectively has a target
dP/dF in the 20GW/Hz ballpark. Any single installation will provide
only a tiny, tiny contribution.
Solar PV is sufficiently important in Spain that it should contribute
its part. (It's in the 19GW ballpark, more than half of demand during daytime.) I don't know if it does.
I suspect from the time of day when this happened it was over supply
of solar PV leading to too high a frequency and/or over voltage events
that led to the cascade failure. Unclear why it didn't pass through a
stable state where supply matched demand though if that really was the
case.
Supply = demand is not a sufficient condition for dynamic stability,
anyway.
I suspect poor network stability analysis played a large part and the
network was still relying on the intrinsic stability of the old
turbine generators that were no longer present. Have to wait for the
report.
Yes. The problem has been anticipated for years.
On 04/05/2025 01:27, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, >>>>>> with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of a
hat if the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled down
by the load. It can be done but the engineering will be interesting.
I suspect from the time of day when this happened it was over supply of
solar PV leading to too high a frequency and/or over voltage events that
led to the cascade failure. Unclear why it didn't pass through a stable
state where supply matched demand though if that really was the case.
I suspect poor network stability analysis played a large part and the
network was still relying on the intrinsic stability of the old turbine generators that were no longer present. Have to wait for the report.
ISTR the electricity supplier in Spain has been warning about this for a while but the politicians were not listening. I wonder if the Spanish government *will* actually publish the results of the investigation.
On 5/4/25 10:49, Martin Brown wrote:
On 04/05/2025 01:27, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 01:53, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 23:55:17 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-03 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>>Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of >>>>>>> inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the
grid, with
detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie, >>>>>>> simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
Where does a gas turbine get the energy from?
Wait, wait, let me think....
Inertia, and then burning gas?
Well, same thing.
Batteries, and panels and wind flaps.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of
a hat if the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled
down by the load.
Not really. It should have a few percent of margin to increase
power delivered when the frequency drops. The point is that the
mains grid is composed of many generators. This only works if they
take collective action. The European grid collectively has a target
dP/dF in the 20GW/Hz ballpark. Any single installation will provide
only a tiny, tiny contribution.
Solar PV is sufficiently important in Spain that it should contribute
its part. (It's in the 19GW ballpark, more than half of demand during daytime.) I don't know if it does.
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they can not rely
on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
But you do have to have serious stored energy available at the drop of a hat if
the inverter is to effectively resist frequency being pulled down by the load.
It can be done but the engineering will be interesting.
I suspect from the time of day when this happened it was over supply of solar PV leading to too high a frequency and/or over voltage events that led to the cascade failure. Unclear why it didn't pass through a stable state where supply
matched demand though if that really was the case.
I suspect poor network stability analysis played a large part and the network was still relying on the intrinsic stability of the old turbine generators that
were no longer present. Have to wait for the report.
ISTR the electricity supplier in Spain has been warning about this for a while
but the politicians were not listening. I wonder if the Spanish government *will* actually publish the results of the investigation.
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they can
not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some islands
have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they can not >>> rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some islands have
successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special
"please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that stayed for a
month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by far.
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they
can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special
"please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by
far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
On Sat, 3 May 2025 21:17:15 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 20:30, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 19:23:11 +0200, Jeroen Belleman
<jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
On 5/3/25 17:12, john larkin wrote:
On Sat, 3 May 2025 14:24:07 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-02 12:03, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 18:41, Bill Sloman wrote:Network grade batteries, none, I believe. There are plans for water >>>>>> pump/generators. Some of the islands do have them.
On 2/05/2025 2:21 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:So it is completely passive. A big battery isn't a primary source but >>>>>>>> it can provide enough DC current to let your grid scale inverter >>>>>>>> generate exactly the AC output that you need.
On 30/04/2025 7:59 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can >>>>>>>>>>>> reacta lot
faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it
*didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is
converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase.
the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy >>>>>>>>>>> which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the >>>>>>>>>>> control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the >>>>>>>>>>> turbine so
its speed is returned to normal.
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical
energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable
without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But it isn't actually doing anything.
Yes it is, basic electrical engineering theory.
In effect it is a constant speed generator connected to variable load;
increase the load and more electrical energy immediately flows into the
load, taking mechanical energy from the inertia of the moving parts. >>>>>>>>> They then begin to slow down and the much more heavily damped mechanical
regulator feeds in more energy to them from the primary source. >>>>>>>>
There is a surprising amount of kinetic energy that can be stored in a >>>>>>> flywheel or other rotating piece of big heavy machinery. The grid has >>>>>>> adopted large scale solar PV and wind farms with some very flaky >>>>>>> inverter technology whose interractions are not at all well understood. >>>>>>>
One of the internal reports I was reading recently mentioned that they >>>>>>> were thinking about funding a PhD to look into some of the complexities.
It is pretty clear that the system is not well thought out.
Why futz around with the rotating metal? It may entertain tourists, >>>>>>>> but that's really all that it is good for.
Because it was always just there and now that it isn't the replacement >>>>>>> inverters on many of the big installations are nowhere near good enough >>>>>>> at simulating the required behaviour. They are too inclined to drop off >>>>>>> and save themselves (much like nuclear plant also does). I suspect that >>>>>>> Spain doesn't have a great deal of battery storage or pumped water. >>>>>>
It seems that solar panels and wind farms mostly have the type of
inverter that follow the shape of the voltage already in the grid, with >>>>>> detection to bail out if things go nuts. There is the suspicion that >>>>>> this was at least part of the problem.
But there is another type of inverters that force the shape, ie,
simulate inertia.
Where do they get the energy from?
To have a bit of margin to regulate, PV installations will have
to either run somewhat below the bleeding edge, or to store a bit
of energy in local batteries.
Jeroen Belleman
Most run at the MPPT point, so have no reserve to save the grid. And a
lot of cloud cover or still wind will precipitate the very crisis that
needs reserve.
With the contribution of solar and wind being oblivious of demand,
the burden of keeping the grid stable must be taken up by thermal
or hydro power plants. When Spain's grid crashed, PV amounted to
well over 50% of the total supply. It makes me wonder why it didn't
crash sooner.
Jeroen Belleman
I'm estimating that half the hazard is the actual physics, power and
energy storage, and half is bad policy and inadequate control theory.
A region should be able to isolate itself without bringing in the same
boat with three or four other countries.
We have the crazy situation in California where sometimes we have to
buy coal-fired power from Nevada, and some times we have to *pay them*
to take our excess power.
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they
can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special
"please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by
far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
On 5/05/2025 12:50 pm, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they
can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special >>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not
by far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
The storage, and the generating capacity, will have been sized with this
in mind.
It means installing more than the bare minimum in wind turbines and
solar panels, but that's cheaper than shipping in loads of diesel fuel,
and building tanks big enough to hold enough diesel to tide you over a
bad couple of days.
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they
can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"?á Or, are residents alerted to special
"please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by
far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time?á I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to
be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:[...]
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out
the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody
can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the >subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out
the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody
can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
On Mon, 5 May 2025 13:45:24 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they
can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special >>>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by >>>> far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to
be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
I'm thinking that it doesn't snow there very much. A few days without
power won't kill many people.
Wind and solar, with 100% diesel backup, probably makes sense for
them. Diesel is expensive.
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out
the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody
can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
On 2025-05-05 15:58, john larkin wrote:
On Mon, 5 May 2025 13:45:24 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they >>>>>>> can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some
islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"?á Or, are residents alerted to special >>>>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests?
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that
stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by >>>>> far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time?á I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to
be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
I'm thinking that it doesn't snow there very much. A few days without
power won't kill many people.
Wind and solar, with 100% diesel backup, probably makes sense for
them. Diesel is expensive.
It doesn't ever snow, look at the map.
The diesel has been there since ever, it is not the backup. It is the
main system, but they are very glad to avoid using it now, thanks to
wind and solar.
On Mon, 5 May 2025 23:31:47 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 15:58, john larkin wrote:
On Mon, 5 May 2025 13:45:24 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they >>>>>>>> can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some >>>>>>>> islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"? Or, are residents alerted to special >>>>>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests? >>>>>>>
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that >>>>>> stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by >>>>>> far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that >>>>> time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to >>>> be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
I'm thinking that it doesn't snow there very much. A few days without
power won't kill many people.
Wind and solar, with 100% diesel backup, probably makes sense for
them. Diesel is expensive.
It doesn't ever snow, look at the map.
The diesel has been there since ever, it is not the backup. It is the
main system, but they are very glad to avoid using it now, thanks to
wind and solar.
Back in the days of analog telephones over copper wires, the US
telephone system central offices had lead-acid battery power
sufficient for 48 hours full operation, plus a diesel backup
generator. This allowed the diesel to be brought online only as
needed, and slowly if repair is needed.
The objective was 0.99999 operational availability, which was usually achieved in practice.
Cell phone systems are happy to achieve 0.90000; maybe we can get them
to 0.99.
Joe
On Mon, 5 May 2025 23:31:47 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 15:58, john larkin wrote:
On Mon, 5 May 2025 13:45:24 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they >>>>>>>> can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some >>>>>>>> islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"?á Or, are residents alerted to special >>>>>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests? >>>>>>>
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that >>>>>> stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by >>>>>> far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that >>>>> time?á I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to >>>> be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
I'm thinking that it doesn't snow there very much. A few days without
power won't kill many people.
Wind and solar, with 100% diesel backup, probably makes sense for
them. Diesel is expensive.
It doesn't ever snow, look at the map.
The diesel has been there since ever, it is not the backup. It is the
main system, but they are very glad to avoid using it now, thanks to
wind and solar.
Back in the days of analog telephones over copper wires, the US
telephone system central offices had lead-acid battery power
sufficient for 48 hours full operation, plus a diesel backup
generator. This allowed the diesel to be brought online only as
needed, and slowly if repair is needed.
The objective was 0.99999 operational availability, which was usually >achieved in practice.
Cell phone systems are happy to achieve 0.90000; maybe we can get them
to 0.99.
Joe
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out
the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody
can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:[...]
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the
subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out >>> the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody >>> can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.
There is no evidence to support your claim at the moment.
On 6/05/2025 5:04 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:[...]
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the
subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out >>> the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody >>> can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.
There is no evidence to support your claim at the moment.
There is negative evidence - there haven't been enough deaths that
anyone can ascribe to political stupidity.
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
[...]
A few days without
power won't kill many people.
It will in the UK if all the 'phones need mains power (either at the subscribers' premises or at the masts). Nobody will be able to call out
the emergency services. How many deaths per day will that be if nobody
can contact the police, fire brigade or ambulance service?
Amazingly fibre to premises can still work OK in a power cut since that
is actually powered off the reserve supply back at the main exchange. Advantages of having a UPS at home.
On 5/5/2025 4:45 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that
time? I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have
to be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-
viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
And, likely, ALL are aware of the potential limitations on available power? Do they have some plan already in place to PROMPTLY notify residents of
an URGENT need to conserve? I.e., so they can react fast enough to
sudden changes in availability (e.g., gensets can fail, too!)
Presumably, enlarging the lakes would allow for additional "surplus"
to be captured?
On 2025-05-06 11:25, Martin Brown wrote:2FSoporte-Fibra-y-ADSL%2FINSTALACION-CAJA-DISTRIBUIDORA-DE-FIBRA-EN-EXTERIOR-DEL-EDIFICIO%2Ftd-p%2F2929655&docid=zZHuHCpt8An46M&tbnid=0T2mKKO1TLeZFM&vet=12ahUKEwiN9onmz46NAxXYVqQEHYnHDk4QM3oECHMQAA..i&w=914&h=611&hcb=2&ved=
Amazingly fibre to premises can still work OK in a power cut since
that is actually powered off the reserve supply back at the main
exchange.
Advantages of having a UPS at home.
Here there are boxes on the walls of the city blocks, where one fibre
from the exchange is divided into half a dozen (exact number unknown to
me). I don't know if these boxes are passive or active.
<https://www.google.com/imgres?q=cajas%20de%20reparto%20de%20fibra%20telefonica&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%2Fimage%2Fserverpage%2Fimage-id%2F111764iC1F6FAD7948695D6%3Fv%3Dv2&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%
<https://www.change.org/p/movistar-cambien-cto-caja-donde-se-conecta-la-fibra-optica-para-poder-realizar-mis-estudios>
I could not test if my landline phone worked during the outage because
my local UPS went down too soon.
On 2025-05-06 11:25, Martin Brown wrote:CAJA-DISTRIBUIDORA-DE-FIBRA-EN-EXTERIOR-DEL-EDIFICIO%2Ftd-p%2F2929655&docid=zZHuHCpt8An46M&tbnid=0T2mKKO1TLeZFM&vet=12ahUKEwiN9onmz46NAxXYVqQEHYnHDk4QM3oECHMQAA..i&w=914&h=611&hcb=2&ved=2ahUKEwiN9onmz46NAxXYVqQEHYnHDk4QM3oECHMQAA>
Amazingly fibre to premises can still work OK in a power cut since
that is actually powered off the reserve supply back at the main
exchange.
Advantages of having a UPS at home.
Here there are boxes on the walls of the city blocks, where one fibre
from the exchange is divided into half a dozen (exact number unknown to
me). I don't know if these boxes are passive or active.
<https://www.google.com/imgres? q=cajas%20de%20reparto%20de%20fibra%20telefonica&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%2Fimage%2Fserverpage%2Fimage-id%2F111764iC1F6FAD7948695D6%3Fv%3Dv2&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%2FSoporte-Fibra-y-ADSL%2FINSTALACION-
<https://www.change.org/p/movistar-cambien-cto-caja-donde-se-conecta-la- fibra-optica-para-poder-realizar-mis-estudios>
I could not test if my landline phone worked during the outage because
my local UPS went down too soon.
On 2025-05-06 00:49, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Mon, 5 May 2025 23:31:47 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 15:58, john larkin wrote:
On Mon, 5 May 2025 13:45:24 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-05 04:50, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 1:55 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-04 22:20, Don Y wrote:
On 5/4/2025 5:34 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
They have it because they need them more. They run isolated, they >>>>>>>>> can not rely on others to smooth their loads. As a result, some >>>>>>>>> islands have successfully run for days on solar/wind only.
Is this just "taken in stride"?á Or, are residents alerted to special >>>>>>>> "please be extra conservative in your energy use TODAY" requests? >>>>>>>>
How does storage capacity correlate with "off hours" demand?
They take it on stride.
I don't live there, nor have visited. I think that the island that >>>>>>> stayed for a month on solar/wind doesn't have heavy industries, not by >>>>>>> far.
So, they did nothing "special" to avoid running out of power for that >>>>>> time?á I.e., they were CONFIDENT in their available surplus (day
AND night) to stick with "life as usual"?
Well, they had their diesel generators on standby. They did not have to >>>>> be confident, they simply were not needed for many days.
<https://www.endesa.com/es/la-cara-e/energias-renovables/gorona-viento-renovable>
You can read it with an automated translator.
The island is small.
<https://maps.app.goo.gl/p5FfPnhvFVKhRN4C8>
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Hierro>
I'm thinking that it doesn't snow there very much. A few days without
power won't kill many people.
Wind and solar, with 100% diesel backup, probably makes sense for
them. Diesel is expensive.
It doesn't ever snow, look at the map.
The diesel has been there since ever, it is not the backup. It is the
main system, but they are very glad to avoid using it now, thanks to
wind and solar.
Back in the days of analog telephones over copper wires, the US
telephone system central offices had lead-acid battery power
sufficient for 48 hours full operation, plus a diesel backup
generator. This allowed the diesel to be brought online only as
needed, and slowly if repair is needed.
The objective was 0.99999 operational availability, which was usually
achieved in practice.
I know. I worked with the 5. :-)
Cell phone systems are happy to achieve 0.90000; maybe we can get them
to 0.99.
Joe
On 06/05/2025 11:26, Carlos E.R. wrote:CAJA-DISTRIBUIDORA-DE-FIBRA-EN-EXTERIOR-DEL-EDIFICIO%2Ftd-p%2F2929655&docid=zZHuHCpt8An46M&tbnid=0T2mKKO1TLeZFM&vet=12ahUKEwiN9onmz46NAxXYVqQEHYnHDk4QM3oECHMQAA..i&w=914&h=611&hcb=2&ved=2ahUKEwiN9onmz46NAxXYVqQEHYnHDk4QM3oECHMQAA>
On 2025-05-06 11:25, Martin Brown wrote:
Amazingly fibre to premises can still work OK in a power cut since
that is actually powered off the reserve supply back at the main
exchange.
Advantages of having a UPS at home.
Here there are boxes on the walls of the city blocks, where one fibre
from the exchange is divided into half a dozen (exact number unknown
to me). I don't know if these boxes are passive or active.
<https://www.google.com/imgres?
q=cajas%20de%20reparto%20de%20fibra%20telefonica&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%2Fimage%2Fserverpage%2Fimage-id%2F111764iC1F6FAD7948695D6%3Fv%3Dv2&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcomunidad.movistar.es%2Ft5%2FSoporte-Fibra-y-ADSL%2FINSTALACION-
<https://www.change.org/p/movistar-cambien-cto-caja-donde-se-conecta-
la-fibra-optica-para-poder-realizar-mis-estudios>
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and it is optical, passive. GPON.
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and it
is optical, passive. GPON.
The fallacy, of course, is that anything between you and where you
want to "go" that is NOT powered limits your reach.
On 2025-05-06 23:52, Don Y wrote:
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and it is >>> optical, passive. GPON.
The fallacy, of course, is that anything between you and where you
want to "go" that is NOT powered limits your reach.
I couldn't test, my own UPS failed too soon.
On 5/7/2025 4:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-06 23:52, Don Y wrote:
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and
it is optical, passive. GPON.
The fallacy, of course, is that anything between you and where you
want to "go" that is NOT powered limits your reach.
I couldn't test, my own UPS failed too soon.
I suspect it would be hard to get a definitive answer.
Can you get out of the city? "State"? Country? etc.
Without knowing the extent of an outage -- and the
reliance on power that exists for each step up the
ladder -- it would be hard to generalize your capabilities
from "simple tests".
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
On 2025-05-07 14:09, Don Y wrote:
On 5/7/2025 4:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-06 23:52, Don Y wrote:
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and it is >>>>> optical, passive. GPON.
The fallacy, of course, is that anything between you and where you
want to "go" that is NOT powered limits your reach.
I couldn't test, my own UPS failed too soon.
I suspect it would be hard to get a definitive answer.
Can you get out of the city? "State"? Country? etc.
Without knowing the extent of an outage -- and the
reliance on power that exists for each step up the
ladder -- it would be hard to generalize your capabilities
from "simple tests".
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
On 6/05/2025 5:13 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 5:04 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
<snip>
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.[...]
There is no evidence to support your claim at the moment.
There is negative evidence - there haven't been enough deaths that
anyone can ascribe to political stupidity.
The conversion to mains-dependency is nowhere near completion yet and
the change has been so rapid that there haven't been any major power
cuts during that time.
It will happen.
Liz Tuddenham, prophet.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 5:04 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.[...]
There is no evidence to support your claim at the moment.
There is negative evidence - there haven't been enough deaths that
anyone can ascribe to political stupidity.
The conversion to mains-dependency is nowhere near completion yet and
the change has been so rapid that there haven't been any major power
cuts during that time.
It will happen.
On 5/7/2025 5:30 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-07 14:09, Don Y wrote:
On 5/7/2025 4:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-06 23:52, Don Y wrote:
Your splitter boxes look to me like they might be powered.
They do, but then I found an article that describes the system and >>>>>> it is optical, passive. GPON.
The fallacy, of course, is that anything between you and where you
want to "go" that is NOT powered limits your reach.
I couldn't test, my own UPS failed too soon.
I suspect it would be hard to get a definitive answer.
Can you get out of the city? "State"? Country? etc.
Without knowing the extent of an outage -- and the
reliance on power that exists for each step up the
ladder -- it would be hard to generalize your capabilities
from "simple tests".
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
Yeah, but you don't know which services (up the chain) may
have their own *local*/private backup systems. E.g., I doubt
your hospitals were without power (?) The extent of backup
beyond that would be something you'd have to know, in advance.
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
Yeah, but you don't know which services (up the chain) may
have their own *local*/private backup systems. E.g., I doubt
your hospitals were without power (?) The extent of backup
beyond that would be something you'd have to know, in advance.
If the fibre goes direct to the exchange, they had backup power. However, if the distance is great and they have to reconstruct the signal with some kind of
optical amplifier, then I don't know. The distance is about 2.5 Km.
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp messages.
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me as soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not reach me till the
power came back; this could be that the fibre went OOS, or that the UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy" the battery
too fast.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 3/05/2025 12:43 am, john larkin wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 11:24:13 +0100, liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
(Liz Tuddenham) wrote:
Chris Jones <lugnut808@spam.yahoo.com> wrote:
There is nothing magic about the current from a rotating generator that >> >>> cannot be exactly replicated by an inverter ...
Inertia. Not magic but physics. A store of energy that can be drawn
on instantly for several seconds. Only an inverter with a massive
energy storage system could match that; domestic systems can't.
A boiler full of superheated water stores a lot of energy too. And
hydraulic steam valve actuators move fast.
Not all that fast. 50Hz is probably more than they could track. 60Hz
would be even more difficult.
They have no problem at a few cycles per second, as London Transport discovered in the early days of computers.
London Transport was powered by Lotts Road Power Station. The load was mainly underground electric railways, trams and trolleybuses. but they
took the electricity supply for their offices from there too. The first computer they installed kept crashing and the problem was traced to dips
in the power supply rails.
After a lot of investigation, they discovered that the AC mains supply
had alternate (or perhaps every third) cycles much lower in voltage than
the others (and I think there must have been a timing error too). The
power supply smoothing capacitors were unable to store enough energy to
tide them over the dips and the result was a regular dropping of the 'stabilised' supply rails.
The fault was traced back to Lotts Road, where it was found that a steam valve was constantly cycling due to an unstable control loop. This
hadn't had any effect on the trams, so nobody had bothered to do
anything about it.
Conclusion:
A tram stores more energy than a computer capacitor bank.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 5:13 pm, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 5:04 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 6/05/2025 2:35 am, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:
<snip>
Even politicians can be relied on to be less stupid than that.[...]
There is no evidence to support your claim at the moment.
There is negative evidence - there haven't been enough deaths that
anyone can ascribe to political stupidity.
The conversion to mains-dependency is nowhere near completion yet and
the change has been so rapid that there haven't been any major power
cuts during that time.
It will happen.
Liz Tuddenham, prophet.
Anything that can go wrong - will.
Anything that can't go wrong - will eventually.
Anything that doesn't go wrong eventually hasn't been tested long
enough.
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
Yeah, but you don't know which services (up the chain) may
have their own *local*/private backup systems. E.g., I doubt
your hospitals were without power (?) The extent of backup
beyond that would be something you'd have to know, in advance.
If the fibre goes direct to the exchange, they had backup power.
However, if the distance is great and they have to reconstruct the
signal with some kind of optical amplifier, then I don't know. The
distance is about 2.5 Km.
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp
messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me
as soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not
reach me till the power came back; this could be that the fibre went
OOS, or that the UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption
and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same server.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy" the
battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
That was the original point of ARPANET then EPSS and later the internet. Packet
switching means that any route to the destination at all will do.
I'm told that my fibre feed is passive optical connectors and splices all the way back the regional exchange about 12 miles away. My local exchange was about
5 miles away and a so-called exchange only direct line (which meant that ADSL 2+ was the limit for me prior to FTTP).
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
Mobile phone masts here typically have a lifetime of about 8-40 hours after power failure depending on how heavily they are being used. Backhaul presumably
is optical or microwave.
Most powercuts tend to be fairly local round here - a regional powercut or a national one requires something truly catastrophic to happen.
I can only recall one UK powercut in that league in the past half century (August 9 2019). Of course it directly affected the densely populated affluent
regions London and the South East. Therefore it was much more newsworthy than if it had affected the remote Scottish Highlands where weather induced powercuts are quite common.
The recent big one at Heathrow didn't affect all that many people although it did take down the whole airport which shows remarkably bad contingency planning
- it should have had supply redundancy and the ability to switchover to it before the diesel generators ran out of fuel. Heads should roll over them having to shut down completely.
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me as >>> soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not reach me >>> till the power came back; this could be that the fibre went OOS, or that the
UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption
and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same server.
I only log external power failures. Kitchen appliance clocks all reset when we
lose power for more than a couple of seconds.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy" the
battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries. I have seen them
swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it remained OK.
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
On 2025-05-02 12:28, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 21:13, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national
grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with
it. This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by
cascade failure.
I should say, although too late, that it should be "Gran Apagón" :-)
Sorry about that. I remember the phrase from my astronomy days when
the Gran Canary were persuaded to go completely dark for one night
only so that the Isaac Newton telescope on its peak could do something
special.
Don't worry :-)
It gave everyone there an opportunity to see a truly dark sky.
Links to it back in 1985 are now very thin on the ground. An article
celebrating 10th anniversary is the best I can find in English page
31. (sorry its very big)
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
That was the original point of ARPANET then EPSS and later the
internet. Packet switching means that any route to the destination at
all will do.
But that assumes there *is* a series of hops that can get you "there"... wherever "there" happens to be. In a nationwide outage, what chance
that everything EXCEPT some critical bit of comms gear is affected?
I'm told that my fibre feed is passive optical connectors and splices
all the way back the regional exchange about 12 miles away. My local
exchange was about 5 miles away and a so-called exchange only direct
line (which meant that ADSL 2+ was the limit for me prior to FTTP).
So, you rely on the exchange having upstream connectivity. Along
with the fiber link TO the exchange.
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive
whatsapp messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
Mobile phone masts here typically have a lifetime of about 8-40 hours
after power failure depending on how heavily they are being used.
Backhaul presumably is optical or microwave.
So, also subject to outage.
Most powercuts tend to be fairly local round here - a regional
powercut or a national one requires something truly catastrophic to
happen.
I can only recall one UK powercut in that league in the past half
century (August 9 2019). Of course it directly affected the densely
populated affluent regions London and the South East. Therefore it was
much more newsworthy than if it had affected the remote Scottish
Highlands where weather induced powercuts are quite common.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
The recent big one at Heathrow didn't affect all that many people
although it did take down the whole airport which shows remarkably bad
contingency planning - it should have had supply redundancy and the
ability to switchover to it before the diesel generators ran out of
fuel. Heads should roll over them having to shut down completely.
Fukishima?
2m (which was when the gauge stopped transmitting). The next morningthere was seaweed hanging off supergrid pylon wires.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy"
the battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest
run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries.
I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick
rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a
real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it remained OK.
Yup. They have a rationalization, though -- they are trying to provide the highest availability. Else, how much availability do you sacrifice to maximize battery life? Do you then start specifying battery life as a primary selection criteria?
[Most SOHO users buy a UPS -- thinking they are being "professional" -- and then discard it when the battery needs replacing and they discover the
costs charged by the UPS manufacturer -- or local "battery stores"]
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Of course. But, they are in the PRIMARY business of selling batteries,
not UPSs!
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
If you were a business, it would just be a maintenance expense.
You would budget for it. If SOHO, you'd likely replace it at
most once and then realize "Gee, I haven't NEEDED this in the
past three years so why am I spending more money on it?"
With the exception of multi-user servers, individual workstations
usually have auto-backup provisions *in* the key applications.
And, in the event of an outage (even if the machine stays up),
the user is usually distracted by the rest of the house/office
going black; is ~15 minutes of uptime going to be enough if the
user isn't AT the machine when power fails?
No one has yet to address the market where TCO is the driving
criteria.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
Yeah, but you don't know which services (up the chain) may
have their own *local*/private backup systems. E.g., I doubt
your hospitals were without power (?) The extent of backup
beyond that would be something you'd have to know, in advance.
If the fibre goes direct to the exchange, they had backup power.
However, if the distance is great and they have to reconstruct the
signal with some kind of optical amplifier, then I don't know. The
distance is about 2.5 Km.
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp
messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me
as soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not
reach me till the power came back; this could be that the fibre went
OOS, or that the UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption
and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same server.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy" the
battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
On 08/05/2025 00:01, Don Y wrote:
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
Well, the power outage was "total". :-D
Yeah, but you don't know which services (up the chain) may
have their own *local*/private backup systems. E.g., I doubt
your hospitals were without power (?) The extent of backup
beyond that would be something you'd have to know, in advance.
If the fibre goes direct to the exchange, they had backup power.
However, if the distance is great and they have to reconstruct the
signal with some kind of optical amplifier, then I don't know. The
distance is about 2.5 Km.
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
That was the original point of ARPANET then EPSS and later the internet. Packet switching means that any route to the destination at all will do.
I'm told that my fibre feed is passive optical connectors and splices
all the way back the regional exchange about 12 miles away. My local
exchange was about 5 miles away and a so-called exchange only direct
line (which meant that ADSL 2+ was the limit for me prior to FTTP).
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp
messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
Mobile phone masts here typically have a lifetime of about 8-40 hours
after power failure depending on how heavily they are being used.
Backhaul presumably is optical or microwave.
Most powercuts tend to be fairly local round here - a regional powercut
or a national one requires something truly catastrophic to happen.
I can only recall one UK powercut in that league in the past half
century (August 9 2019). Of course it directly affected the densely
populated affluent regions London and the South East. Therefore it was
much more newsworthy than if it had affected the remote Scottish
Highlands where weather induced powercuts are quite common.
The recent big one at Heathrow didn't affect all that many people
although it did take down the whole airport which shows remarkably bad contingency planning - it should have had supply redundancy and the
ability to switchover to it before the diesel generators ran out of
fuel. Heads should roll over them having to shut down completely.
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me
as soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not
reach me till the power came back; this could be that the fibre went
OOS, or that the UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption
and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same server.
I only log external power failures. Kitchen appliance clocks all reset
when we lose power for more than a couple of seconds.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy"
the battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest run
time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries. I
have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a real
corroded rusty mess but electronics above it remained OK.
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
I can only recall one UK powercut in that league in the past half
century (August 9 2019). Of course it directly affected the densely
populated affluent regions London and the South East. Therefore it was
much more newsworthy than if it had affected the remote Scottish
Highlands where weather induced powercuts are quite common.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy"
the battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest
run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries.
I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick
rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a
real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it remained OK.
Yup. They have a rationalization, though -- they are trying to provide the highest availability. Else, how much availability do you sacrifice to maximize battery life? Do you then start specifying battery life as a primary selection criteria?
[Most SOHO users buy a UPS -- thinking they are being "professional" -- and then discard it when the battery needs replacing and they discover the
costs charged by the UPS manufacturer -- or local "battery stores"]
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Of course. But, they are in the PRIMARY business of selling batteries,
not UPSs!
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
If you were a business, it would just be a maintenance expense.
You would budget for it. If SOHO, you'd likely replace it at
most once and then realize "Gee, I haven't NEEDED this in the
past three years so why am I spending more money on it?"
With the exception of multi-user servers, individual workstations
usually have auto-backup provisions *in* the key applications.
And, in the event of an outage (even if the machine stays up),
the user is usually distracted by the rest of the house/office
going black; is ~15 minutes of uptime going to be enough if the
user isn't AT the machine when power fails?
No one has yet to address the market where TCO is the driving
criteria.
On 2025-05-08 01:01, Don Y wrote:
Much like me having carrier doesn't tell me the extent of
my "reach", here.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy"
the battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach
of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to
bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
And trickle charge continuously.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
Indeed.
I saw in an Eaton model they mentioned two strategies - translated from Spanish:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
Eaton Ellipse ECO 650 IEC SAI Offline 650VA 400W
Eaton P/N: EL650IEC
I still have not investigated.
El 02/05/2025 a las 23:30, Carlos E.R. escribió:
On 2025-05-02 12:28, Martin Brown wrote:
On 01/05/2025 21:13, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-29 14:24, Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national
grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with
it. This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by
cascade failure.
I should say, although too late, that it should be "Gran Apagón" :-)
Sorry about that. I remember the phrase from my astronomy days when
the Gran Canary were persuaded to go completely dark for one night
only so that the Isaac Newton telescope on its peak could do
something special.
Don't worry :-)
It gave everyone there an opportunity to see a truly dark sky.
Links to it back in 1985 are now very thin on the ground. An article
celebrating 10th anniversary is the best I can find in English page
31. (sorry its very big)
As a side note, the Apagón made all my DCF-77 clocks synchronize inmediately. Usually Madrid has reception problems, taking even weeks to synchronize, but looks like it is more an interference issue than the distance to Mainflingen.
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a
rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the
battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
On 2025-05-08 14:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
{Phrase translated by DeepL, so inconsistent: Topología UPS: En espera (Fuera de línea) o Standby (Offline)}
I do not see a reference to that "topology" except at the vendor. But it
says that the expected battery life is 4 years.
On 08/05/2025 13:43, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a
rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
That was during the various coal miners strikes which were at their peak then. Local newspapers had rotas for planned supply cuts.
ISTR there was still the odd planned power cut even in the late 1970's
but they became increasingly rare after that.
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
On 30/04/2025 8:41 pm, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-04-30 11:59, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:
... pumped hydro storage has the spinning
turbines, but grid scale batteries have invereters, which can reacta lot >>>>> faster than any spinning turbine,
I thought the stabilising effect of a spinning turbine was because it
*didn't* react quickly.
The grid frequency begins to fall so energy from the moving parts is
converted to electrical power which is fed into the grid to increase.
the frequency. This results in a loss of stored mechanical energy which
causes the turbine to begin slowing down - which is detected by the
control system and used to feed more water/gas/steam into the turbine so >>>> its speed is returned to normal.
I understand that the turbine doesn't actually slow down, because the
generator starts working as a synchronous motor drawing energy from the
network instead; this is detected by the control system and feeds more
water/gas/steam, etc.
It doesn't slow down much, but there's no such thing as instantaneous
feedback - you have to an input change before you can start correcting
the output.
As long as the network keeps the frequency.
The "network" can't keep the frequency - it's the corrections that keep
the low term frequency stable
The interface between the stored mechanical energy and the electrical
energy demand has an almost instant response and is inherently stable
without needing elaborate control algorithms.
But the stored mechanical energy in the spinning rotor can only get fed
into the grid if the rotor slows down.
The generator has to have a control system to control the power being
feed into the rotor to keep it spinning at the same speed while more
energy is being extracted from it.
There's nothing magically stable about that kind of control system - it
has to be designed to stable like any other feedback mechanism.
There are two mechanisms at work here:
1) The coupling between the rotating machine and the grid, which is virtually instantaneous and extracts mechanical energy from the rotating 'store' without any special control system. It is inherently stable.
2) The coupling between the rotating machine and the 'prime mover'
power source, which puts mechanical energy into the rotating 'store'.
This is slower to respond and does need careful control to keep it
stable.
The difference between these two shows up as a change in the speed of rotation.
Martin Brown <'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
On 08/05/2025 13:43, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a
rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to
switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the
battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
That was during the various coal miners strikes which were at their peak
then. Local newspapers had rotas for planned supply cuts.
ISTR there was still the odd planned power cut even in the late 1970's
but they became increasingly rare after that.
A "Disconnection Rota" marker has recently started appearing on my electricity bill.
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a
rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the
battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
<...>
On 08/05/2025 14:41, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-08 14:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
{Phrase translated by DeepL, so inconsistent: Topología UPS: En espera
(Fuera de línea) o Standby (Offline)}
There are (at least) two major UPS topologies in play.
One is where the power to the protected device is always made by the
inverter and maintained at the correct main voltage irrespective of
input voltage to the UPS. Useful in places where the local mains supply voltage goes up and down a lot depending on load.
The other is a pass through of input mains voltage to the load under
normal conditions and an isolation relay plus cold start of the inverter within a couple of cycles of the supply failure. This is more than good enough for PCs. Mine can withstand a 1s blackout unprotected without any difficulty but kitchen white goods clocks cannot.
I do not see a reference to that "topology" except at the vendor. But
it says that the expected battery life is 4 years.
On 08/05/2025 12:49, Don Y wrote:
But where can exchange traffic go? See what I mean? Anyone that
you want to contact (and everyone along the way) must be "up".
That was the original point of ARPANET then EPSS and later the internet. >>> Packet switching means that any route to the destination at all will do.
But that assumes there *is* a series of hops that can get you "there"...
wherever "there" happens to be. In a nationwide outage, what chance
that everything EXCEPT some critical bit of comms gear is affected?
Nationwide outages should be exceptionally rare. Never had one in the UK but the way they are going one winter's day it will happen.
Most powercuts tend to be fairly local round here - a regional powercut or a
national one requires something truly catastrophic to happen.
I can only recall one UK powercut in that league in the past half century >>> (August 9 2019). Of course it directly affected the densely populated
affluent regions London and the South East. Therefore it was much more
newsworthy than if it had affected the remote Scottish Highlands where
weather induced powercuts are quite common.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
They do that routinely where I live once a year for trimming trees that might otherwise short out live supply lines or worse fall onto them.
I wouldn't describe that 2019 powercut as deliberate either it was a huge MFU caused by a single lightning strike to an insignificant power plant that lead to a cascade network failure.
We typically lose power a couple of times a year due to very high winds toppling poles and/or the sort of snow that sticks onto trees and makes them break. The mains poles here are now antique. Installed ~1950's and the bases are rotten. Unsafe for linesmen to climb and marked as such.
The recent big one at Heathrow didn't affect all that many people although >>> it did take down the whole airport which shows remarkably bad contingency >>> planning - it should have had supply redundancy and the ability to
switchover to it before the diesel generators ran out of fuel. Heads should >>> roll over them having to shut down completely.
Fukishima?
Genuine natural disaster beyond what the designers had considered. They almost
got away with it but didn't. Tsunami are absolutely terrifying. Another one when I was in Japan in the hours of darkness was reported as >2m (which was when the gauge stopped transmitting). The next morning there was seaweed hanging off supergrid pylon wires.
I'm considering replacing the UPS at my router. Some UPS "destroy" the >>>>> battery too fast.
Yes. Rather than spend time investigating it, I've taken the approach >>>> of just rescuing batteries to replace those that have been "cooked".
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest run >>> time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries. I have >>> seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick rubber gloves >>> needed to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a real corroded rusty >>> mess but electronics above it remained OK.
Yup. They have a rationalization, though -- they are trying to provide the >> highest availability. Else, how much availability do you sacrifice to
maximize battery life? Do you then start specifying battery life as a
primary selection criteria?
I think they probably could back off the fast recharge a bit. I'm always nervous of going back on again too soon after power is restored (even though my
systems are reasonably fault tolerant). Sometimes the mains restoration goes on
and off several times a few seconds apart if there are still other transient leak to ground faults on the lines.
Of course. But, they are in the PRIMARY business of selling batteries,
not UPSs!
A bit like printers then.
With the exception of multi-user servers, individual workstations
usually have auto-backup provisions *in* the key applications.
And, in the event of an outage (even if the machine stays up),
the user is usually distracted by the rest of the house/office
going black; is ~15 minutes of uptime going to be enough if the
user isn't AT the machine when power fails?
No one has yet to address the market where TCO is the driving
criteria.
To some extent it is an insurance policy to not lose what I'm working on if the
power does go down suddenly. Despite having theoretical lightning protect as well I also shutdown when there are thunderstorms about.
I saw what a big lightning strike to our works building did to the switchboard
and mainframe. The surge protection devices on a big chunky copper bus bar saved themselves by allowing transients to fry all of the terminal driver boards. The phone lines were just a sooty shadow on the wall and it blew the clip on covers off the cable way.
About once a decade we get lightning to tree strikes within 100m. It usually fries bedside clocks and modems (although mine survived OK last time). This was
despite a 1" calorific spark jumping off it.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
Not the same, but past Monday someone stole the signalling cable in the high speed railway to Andalussia, leaving the entire line OOS. I heard that trains were authorized to run at 40 Km/h, so that they could see the other train in time and tail it. Not sure it worked.
The authorities talked of sabotage. The price of the cable when new is not even
a thousand euros, but the damage to thousands of people is huge.
Yup. They have a rationalization, though -- they are trying to provide the >> highest availability. Else, how much availability do you sacrifice to
maximize battery life? Do you then start specifying battery life as a
primary selection criteria?
[Most SOHO users buy a UPS -- thinking they are being "professional" -- and >> then discard it when the battery needs replacing and they discover the
costs charged by the UPS manufacturer -- or local "battery stores"]
25€. A 9Ah item, high discharge rate.
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to >>>> bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the
highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Of course. But, they are in the PRIMARY business of selling batteries,
not UPSs!
Ugh.
And having disgruntled customers.
With the exception of multi-user servers, individual workstations
usually have auto-backup provisions *in* the key applications.
And, in the event of an outage (even if the machine stays up),
the user is usually distracted by the rest of the house/office
going black; is ~15 minutes of uptime going to be enough if the
user isn't AT the machine when power fails?
You need software monitoring to hibernate or power off the machine.
No one has yet to address the market where TCO is the driving
criteria.
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest run time
for the sales datasheet means that they cook their batteries. I have seen
them swell to the point of bursting inside a UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed >> to remove the remains. Support metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but >> electronics above it remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5 months short.
I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apagón.
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I was working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood. We were not allowed to have the lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test equipment so we would huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep warm, they used to put out a lot
of heat.
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive whatsapp messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
No. I don't know if they have centralized server or distributed.
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email me as >>> soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did not reach me >>> till the power came back; this could be that the fibre went OOS, or that the
UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
The one on the server did, yes, but the one on the router doesn't have that facility.
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption
and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same server.
I don't think any of mine can report power usage.
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
Indeed.
I saw in an Eaton model they mentioned two strategies - translated from Spanish:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
Eaton Ellipse ECO 650 IEC SAI Offline 650VA 400W
Eaton P/N: EL650IEC
On 08/05/2025 14:41, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-08 14:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
{Phrase translated by DeepL, so inconsistent: Topología UPS: En espera (Fuera
de línea) o Standby (Offline)}
There are (at least) two major UPS topologies in play.
One is where the power to the protected device is always made by the inverter and maintained at the correct main voltage irrespective of input voltage to the
UPS. Useful in places where the local mains supply voltage goes up and down a lot depending on load.
The other is a pass through of input mains voltage to the load under normal conditions and an isolation relay plus cold start of the inverter within a couple of cycles of the supply failure. This is more than good enough for PCs.
Mine can withstand a 1s blackout unprotected without any difficulty but kitchen
white goods clocks cannot.
I do not see a reference to that "topology" except at the vendor. But it says
that the expected battery life is 4 years.
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it.
This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade
failure.
It seems likely they had got the effect of widespread solar PV has on
load shedding wrong (much like happened in the UK) and so it failed completely. Two events a second apart delivered the coup de grace.
Making money implies efficiency. And vice versa.
On 5/8/2025 12:51 PM, KevinJ93 wrote:
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I
was working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood. We were not allowed to
have the lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test
equipment so we would huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep
warm, they used to put out a lot of heat.
The only "utility" that I can recall being VOLUNTARILY rationed was water, back east, during a period of drought. We were "strongly discouragd"
from watering lawns, washing cars (car washes are far more efficient
at this as they recycle the water), etc.
Here, of course (desert southwest), peer pressure and threats of fines
tend to keep folks inline.
The idea of using a garden hose to "sweep" debris off your
driveway or sidewalk would be met with a gasp and a glare.
On 08/05/2025 17:19, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Martin Brown <'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
On 08/05/2025 13:43, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced >>>> a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a
rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to >>> switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the
battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
That was during the various coal miners strikes which were at their peak >> then. Local newspapers had rotas for planned supply cuts.
ISTR there was still the odd planned power cut even in the late 1970's
but they became increasingly rare after that.
A "Disconnection Rota" marker has recently started appearing on my electricity bill.
You still get paper ones? I confess I haven't actually looked at my
virtual "paper" electricity bill for ages. I use the online portal to
check usage and how much they have taken in DD for prepayment.
On 5/8/2025 7:18 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
On 08/05/2025 14:41, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-08 14:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
{Phrase translated by DeepL, so inconsistent: Topología UPS: En
espera (Fuera de línea) o Standby (Offline)}
There are (at least) two major UPS topologies in play.
One is where the power to the protected device is always made by the
inverter and maintained at the correct main voltage irrespective of
input voltage to the UPS. Useful in places where the local mains
supply voltage goes up and down a lot depending on load.
These are usually called "double conversion" (some call them "online"
but that can be misleading).
Most of these (that I've encountered) are less efficient (cuz they
are always in-the-loop) and often won't START without a functioning
battery.
The other is a pass through of input mains voltage to the load under
normal conditions and an isolation relay plus cold start of the
inverter within a couple of cycles of the supply failure. This is more
than good enough for PCs. Mine can withstand a 1s blackout unprotected
without any difficulty but kitchen white goods clocks cannot.
These often can do some line voltage adjusting with an autotransformer
"for free" (part of the design).
They, also, are available in models that can be started only with a
valid battery or not. Some require mains voltage to be present, as well.
There are also cheaper units that use "stepped" waveforms to approximate
a sine wave; others that are more religious in their determination.
I do not see a reference to that "topology" except at the vendor. But
it says that the expected battery life is 4 years.
Ask for a guarantee on that... :>
[ObTrivia: SWMBO's vehicle needed a starting battery replacement
~3 years after purchase (battery life is about that for all vehicles,
here; the heat cooks them). As that was within the ~5 year "factory warranty" period, it was no charge -- so I didn't bother to get
involved!
THAT battery, of course, failed 3 years later. But, as it was
considered part of the original vehicle (despite being a replacement),
there was no warranty extended to it.
So, I went to Costco and bought one to avoid the dealer's insane
charges!]
On 08/05/2025 22:18, Don Y wrote:
On 5/8/2025 12:51 PM, KevinJ93 wrote:
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I was >>> working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood. We were not allowed to have the
lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test equipment so we would >>> huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep warm, they used to put out a >>> lot of heat.
The only "utility" that I can recall being VOLUNTARILY rationed was water, >> back east, during a period of drought. We were "strongly discouragd"
from watering lawns, washing cars (car washes are far more efficient
at this as they recycle the water), etc.
We also live on the watershed for that. Just far enough north to be on the copious Northumbrian water supply (intended for all the now defunct steelworks)
but with sewage outflow going downhill to Yorkshire Water.
It has great advantages - Yorkshire Water has many leaks and not enough reservoirs so hose pipe bans are almost inevitable every summer. One particularly bad year they were moving drinking water in tankers from Northumberland Water to Yorkshire to maintain supply. When it gets really serious they have had to resort to stand pipes in the street.
Looks like this year will be a bumper year for drought orders as there hasn't been any significant rain here for nearly a month now and we have have broken record temperatures for May already. Reservoirs in sensitive areas are at abnormally low levels for this time of year.
Here, of course (desert southwest), peer pressure and threats of fines
tend to keep folks inline.
The idea of using a garden hose to "sweep" debris off your
driveway or sidewalk would be met with a gasp and a glare.
Fair enough. Where I live the water supply is the huge Kielder reservoir built
to service a once thriving major steel industry on Teesside. Even if it didn't
rain at all for a year we would still be on supply.
Next village is on Yorkshire and often get hosepipe bans in summer.
My mobile phone worked all the day, I could send and receive
whatsapp messages.
Are those processed "locally"?
No. I don't know if they have centralized server or distributed.
Some have "content distribution networks".
I have a small computer doing server things, and it tried to email
me as soon as the UPS said it was running on battery. That email did
not reach me till the power came back; this could be that the fibre
went OOS, or that the UPS at my router went down instantly. I do not
know.
Doesn't your UPS deliver log messages (to a syslog server or data
dumps to an FTP service)?
The one on the server did, yes, but the one on the router doesn't have
that facility.
I used to think syslogd support was just another gimmick. But,
I've come to appreciate being able to find ALL of the logs
on ONE server (that is always up). Hard to examine a log on
a device that won't boot, etc.
I have each of mine configured to give me summaries of power consumption >>> and line conditions each minute. And, use a syslogd on that same
server.
I don't think any of mine can report power usage.
IIRC, they report:
Date/Time
Vmin/Vmax (input)
Vout/Iout
%Wout/%VAout/%capacity
Frequency
Vbat
Internal temperature
"external" temperature & humidity (intended for use in a server room)
Charging at a slower rate and to a lower float voltage would
compromise the UPS's availability -- but provide less maintenance costs
(of course, the manufacturer wants to sell you batteries, so you
can see where their priorities will lie!)
Indeed.
I saw in an Eaton model they mentioned two strategies - translated
from Spanish:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
Eaton Ellipse ECO 650 IEC SAI Offline 650VA 400W
Eaton P/N: EL650IEC
I have a couple of eatons in the garage. I didn't like them for
use in the office as their fans (run continuously) are louder
than I would like (and I have no desire to go tweaking fans)
cer@Isengard:~> upsc salicru
battery.charge: 100
battery.voltage: 13.60
battery.voltage.high: 13.60
battery.voltage.low: 10.40
battery.voltage.nominal: 12.0
device.type: ups
driver.name: blazer_usb
driver.parameter.pollinterval: 2
driver.parameter.port: auto
driver.parameter.synchronous: no
driver.version: 2.7.4
driver.version.internal: 0.12
input.current.nominal: 3.0
input.frequency: 50.0
input.frequency.nominal: 50
input.voltage: 229.4
input.voltage.fault: 229.4
input.voltage.nominal: 230
output.voltage: 229.4
ups.beeper.status: enabled
ups.delay.shutdown: 30
ups.delay.start: 180
ups.load: 13
ups.productid: 5161
ups.status: FSD OL
ups.temperature: 25.0
ups.type: offline / line interactive
ups.vendorid: 0665
cer@Isengard:~>
It doesn't report current. There is "ups.load: 13", but no idea of the units.
I saw in an Eaton model they mentioned two strategies - translated from
Spanish:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
Eaton Ellipse ECO 650 IEC SAI Offline 650VA 400W
Eaton P/N: EL650IEC
I have a couple of eatons in the garage. I didn't like them for
use in the office as their fans (run continuously) are louder
than I would like (and I have no desire to go tweaking fans)
Ah, no, no fan in mine.
On 5/9/2025 1:21 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
On 08/05/2025 22:18, Don Y wrote:
On 5/8/2025 12:51 PM, KevinJ93 wrote:
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I
was working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood. We were not allowed
to have the lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test
equipment so we would huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep
warm, they used to put out a lot of heat.
The only "utility" that I can recall being VOLUNTARILY rationed was
water,
back east, during a period of drought. We were "strongly discouragd"
from watering lawns, washing cars (car washes are far more efficient
at this as they recycle the water), etc.
We also live on the watershed for that. Just far enough north to be on
the copious Northumbrian water supply (intended for all the now
defunct steelworks) but with sewage outflow going downhill to
Yorkshire Water.
We always had ample water -- so it was *common* to use a hose as a broom.
Or, to water a lawn, wash a car in the driveway, etc.
The "drought restrictions" were a bit of a shock to people as everyone
always thought water was limitless. Driving around town there were
many reservoirs -- some in places where only a single lane road would separate you from the reservoir to your left vs. the one on your right.
It has great advantages - Yorkshire Water has many leaks and not
enough reservoirs so hose pipe bans are almost inevitable every
summer. One particularly bad year they were moving drinking water in
tankers from Northumberland Water to Yorkshire to maintain supply.
When it gets really serious they have had to resort to stand pipes in
the street.
Looks like this year will be a bumper year for drought orders as there
hasn't been any significant rain here for nearly a month now and we
have have broken record temperatures for May already. Reservoirs in
sensitive areas are at abnormally low levels for this time of year.
We've (here) been in a state of drought for ~25 years. And, that's
with an normal annual precipitation of ~11 inches. The shift in mindset
is astonishing -- to go from ~50 in/yr to less than a quarter of that.
And, for it to be confined to just 2.5 months out of the year...
Here, of course (desert southwest), peer pressure and threats of fines
tend to keep folks inline.
The idea of using a garden hose to "sweep" debris off your
driveway or sidewalk would be met with a gasp and a glare.
Fair enough. Where I live the water supply is the huge Kielder
reservoir built to service a once thriving major steel industry on
Teesside. Even if it didn't rain at all for a year we would still be
on supply.
Next village is on Yorkshire and often get hosepipe bans in summer.
We "store" water in the ground. The hope being that we can extract
it when the time comes.
There have been some foreign companies exploiting our water supplies
(deep wells to farm and then export the farmed products). I htink
there is some action being taken to confound this practice.
john larkin wrote:
Making money implies efficiency. And vice versa.
That's what the Left fundamentally fails to understand.
Martin Brown wrote:
Spain suffered a very spectacular near total loss of its national grid
yesterday taking parts of France and all of Portugal down with it.
This is an unprecedented failure of a supergrid system by cascade
failure.
It seems likely they had got the effect of widespread solar PV has on
load shedding wrong (much like happened in the UK) and so it failed
completely. Two events a second apart delivered the coup de grace.
It looks like they spent a lot more effort simulating climate than they
did simulating the grid system.
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced
a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
Not the same, but past Monday someone stole the signalling cable in
the high speed railway to Andalussia, leaving the entire line OOS. I
heard that trains were authorized to run at 40 Km/h, so that they
could see the other train in time and tail it. Not sure it worked.
The authorities talked of sabotage. The price of the cable when new is
not even a thousand euros, but the damage to thousands of people is huge.
There are places where copper products (wire, plumbing) are stolen
for their "recycle value". The solution, so far, has been to
require recyclers to get and record identification of people
bringing in such items.
A friend had the copper stripped from the roof-mounted cooling unit at
his business. Landlord held *him* responsible for its repair/replacement.
I think there have been cases of people trying to steal the wiring in
outside lighting systems -- and not taking adequate provisions to
protect against electrocution!
I would like to make some backlit copper lighted displays for the house
(AZ is The Copper State) but am afraid its oxidized color would attract
some thief eager to make a few dollars off it.
Yup. They have a rationalization, though -- they are trying to
provide the
highest availability. Else, how much availability do you sacrifice to
maximize battery life? Do you then start specifying battery life as a
primary selection criteria?
[Most SOHO users buy a UPS -- thinking they are being "professional"
-- and
then discard it when the battery needs replacing and they discover the
costs charged by the UPS manufacturer -- or local "battery stores"]
25€. A 9Ah item, high discharge rate.
Different grades exist, here. If you buy from an electronics supplier (e.g., Digikey), you will likely get a "fairer" price (value for money)
than a local battery store (which may be 50% higher). UPS manufacturers typically charge about double what a reasonable price might be (though
the usually assemble the batteries into the requisite "packs"...
a trivial exercise for even 48V units).
Digikey used to have a policy of free shipping for prepaid (cash)
orders. I would buy batteries in lots of 10 and send prepayment.
Shipping charges can be a significant fraction of a battery's
cost. They now exclude batteries from this policy (when I last
checked).
I suspect the problem (rationalized by the manufacturers) is trying to >>>>> bring the battery back to full charge ASAP -- as well as keeping the >>>>> highest state of charge that the battery can support.
Which taken to extremes is very bad for battery life.
Of course. But, they are in the PRIMARY business of selling batteries, >>> not UPSs!
Ugh.
And having disgruntled customers.
Think about it. If the *UPS* (hardware) failed at 3 year intervals,
no one would buy them! They'd be seen as poor quality.
But, no one is surprised that BATTERIES need replacement!
With the exception of multi-user servers, individual workstations
usually have auto-backup provisions *in* the key applications.
And, in the event of an outage (even if the machine stays up),
the user is usually distracted by the rest of the house/office
going black; is ~15 minutes of uptime going to be enough if the
user isn't AT the machine when power fails?
You need software monitoring to hibernate or power off the machine.
I have every workstation set to hibernate after ~20 minutes
of inactivity. This gives me time to get a cup of tea, go to
the bathroom, answer the door/phone, etc. without the workstation
cycling off and on.
As "activity" is defined by user interactions, this means I
have to deliberately start an application that disables "sleep"
if I won't be interacting with the machine and want to prevent
it from sleeping. E.g., an SSH session with a remote host that
will be busy for a while; if the workstation sleeps, the SSH
session terminates and the shell on the remote is killed off.
<frown>
No one has yet to address the market where TCO is the driving
criteria.
Martin Brown <'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
On 08/05/2025 17:19, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Martin Brown <'''newspam'''@nonad.co.uk> wrote:
On 08/05/2025 13:43, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
I don't think I've ever (regardless of where I've lived) experienced >>>>>> a deliberate power cut. A drunk may take out a telephone pole or
a branch may fall on some high tension wires but no one has ever
said "sorry, we're turning the lights out" (for whatever reason)
That was exactly what happened in the UK in the early 1970s; we had a >>>>> rota of power cuts lasting 4 hours each. I made up an automatic
lighting unit based on a car battery for my parents. It used relays to >>>>> switch on when the mains went, then recharge at a fast rate until the >>>>> battery voltage rose high enough, then trickle charge.
That was during the various coal miners strikes which were at their peak >>>> then. Local newspapers had rotas for planned supply cuts.
ISTR there was still the odd planned power cut even in the late 1970's >>>> but they became increasingly rare after that.
A "Disconnection Rota" marker has recently started appearing on my
electricity bill.
You still get paper ones? I confess I haven't actually looked at my
virtual "paper" electricity bill for ages. I use the online portal to
check usage and how much they have taken in DD for prepayment.
I still pay individual paper bills. Last year they sent me a ridiculous
bill which they said was recalculated from several bills going back over
more than a year. Their calculations were a load of nonsense and, after three hours working on it, a friend who is a retired accountant gave up
in despair.
I made payment conditional on a satisfactory explanation of how they had calculated the bill. Then they started sending weekly automated threats
of bailiffs being sent to recover the 'debt' and the damage they would
do to my credit rating. I sent many letters asking for an explanation,
which merely received standard replies that didn't address my questions. Eventually they ceased replying and I never paid the bill.
The government has now made that practice illegal, but if I had been on Direct Debit, they would have taken the money and I wouldn't have been
able to get it back.
We "store" water in the ground. The hope being that we can extract
it when the time comes.
There have been some foreign companies exploiting our water supplies
(deep wells to farm and then export the farmed products). I htink
there is some action being taken to confound this practice.
Yesterday I heard on the news that most cities in the USA are sinking down, due
to water extraction from wells.
They, also, are available in models that can be started only with a
valid battery or not. Some require mains voltage to be present, as well.
Right, they call this "cold start".
There are also cheaper units that use "stepped" waveforms to approximate
a sine wave; others that are more religious in their determination.
This is more difficult to find from the specs. Price could be an indication.
I do not see a reference to that "topology" except at the vendor. But it >>>> says that the expected battery life is 4 years.
Ask for a guarantee on that... :>
Hah! The warranty is two years :-D
However, I do have another unit from this brand, and the battery did last longer. This particular unit uses two batteries, 24 volts, actually.
Usually, I stick a label outside where I write the date when I replace the battery, and the price, but on this particular UPS I don't see the label. So I
don't know the actual duration. Maybe I put the label inside?
[ObTrivia: SWMBO's vehicle needed a starting battery replacement
~3 years after purchase (battery life is about that for all vehicles,
here; the heat cooks them). As that was within the ~5 year "factory
warranty" period, it was no charge -- so I didn't bother to get
involved!
THAT battery, of course, failed 3 years later. But, as it was
considered part of the original vehicle (despite being a replacement),
there was no warranty extended to it.
So, I went to Costco and bought one to avoid the dealer's insane
charges!]
That's funny. My car battery is currently 6 year old, and going fine, according
to the garage (they just checked it). There was some "sulphate" on the lead stud which I told them to check.
And here it is hot weather, for about 5 months a year. :-?
On 5/9/2025 3:29 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
cer@Isengard:~> upsc salicru
battery.charge: 100
battery.voltage: 13.60
battery.voltage.high: 13.60
battery.voltage.low: 10.40
battery.voltage.nominal: 12.0
device.type: ups
driver.name: blazer_usb
driver.parameter.pollinterval: 2
driver.parameter.port: auto
driver.parameter.synchronous: no
driver.version: 2.7.4
driver.version.internal: 0.12
input.current.nominal: 3.0
input.frequency: 50.0
input.frequency.nominal: 50
input.voltage: 229.4
input.voltage.fault: 229.4
input.voltage.nominal: 230
output.voltage: 229.4
ups.beeper.status: enabled
ups.delay.shutdown: 30
ups.delay.start: 180
ups.load: 13
ups.productid: 5161
ups.status: FSD OL
ups.temperature: 25.0
ups.type: offline / line interactive
ups.vendorid: 0665
cer@Isengard:~>
It doesn't report current. There is "ups.load: 13", but no idea of the
units.
It may be percent of maximum or somesuch.
I saw in an Eaton model they mentioned two strategies - translated
from Spanish:
UPS Topology: Standby (Offline) or Standby (Offline)
Eaton Ellipse ECO 650 IEC SAI Offline 650VA 400W
Eaton P/N: EL650IEC
I have a couple of eatons in the garage. I didn't like them for
use in the office as their fans (run continuously) are louder
than I would like (and I have no desire to go tweaking fans)
Ah, no, no fan in mine.
These are 2KVA and larger. When on battery, there is a
fair bit of waste heat that has to be blown off lest the
internal temperature rise too much.
I figure whoever specified the fans must have considered
their efficiency so wouldn't want to go playing around
with alternate devices and discover something died
prematurely, as a result.
[And, lots of UPSs available for rescue. I brought home
four 2200VA units two weeks ago and decided to scrap them
as they were double-conversion models. I cut off the
#12AWG power cords and made four "extension cords" from
the set!]
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest
run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a
UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it
remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some
power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years. In probably 80% of
them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery
or battery PACK is difficult. This is especially true of the "better"
UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design. Often one has to disassemble
the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apagón.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last, even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something
to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
It's
REALLY inconvenient to have to replace them *now* cuz they
are costly and physically inconvenient to man-handle. I
would much appreciate some advance notice that they are likely
to need replacement in, say, 30 days (given the current usage
pattern).
Maybe folks will start putting more smarts into their product
designs instead of simple "threshold" events.
On 5/8/2025 12:51 PM, KevinJ93 wrote:
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I was
working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood.á We were not allowed to have the >> lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test equipment so we would >> huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep warm, they used to put out a lot
of heat.
The only "utility" that I can recall being VOLUNTARILY rationed was water, >back east, during a period of drought. We were "strongly discouragd"
from watering lawns, washing cars (car washes are far more efficient
at this as they recycle the water), etc.
Here, of course (desert southwest), peer pressure and threats of fines
tend to keep folks inline.
The idea of using a garden hose to "sweep" debris off your
driveway or sidewalk would be met with a gasp and a glare.
On 2025-05-09 12:38, Don Y wrote:
On 5/9/2025 1:21 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
On 08/05/2025 22:18, Don Y wrote:
On 5/8/2025 12:51 PM, KevinJ93 wrote:
When the coal miner's strike power usage reductions were in effect I >>>>> was working at Marconi-Elliott in Borehamwood.á We were not allowed
to have the lights or heating on but it was permitted to use test
equipment so we would huddle around our Tektronix 547 scopes to keep >>>>> warm, they used to put out a lot of heat.
The only "utility" that I can recall being VOLUNTARILY rationed was
water,
back east, during a period of drought.á We were "strongly discouragd"
from watering lawns, washing cars (car washes are far more efficient
at this as they recycle the water), etc.
We also live on the watershed for that. Just far enough north to be on
the copious Northumbrian water supply (intended for all the now
defunct steelworks) but with sewage outflow going downhill to
Yorkshire Water.
We always had ample water -- so it was *common* to use a hose as a broom.
Or, to water a lawn, wash a car in the driveway, etc.
The "drought restrictions" were a bit of a shock to people as everyone
always thought water was limitless.á Driving around town there were
many reservoirs -- some in places where only a single lane road would
separate you from the reservoir to your left vs. the one on your right.
It has great advantages - Yorkshire Water has many leaks and not
enough reservoirs so hose pipe bans are almost inevitable every
summer. One particularly bad year they were moving drinking water in
tankers from Northumberland Water to Yorkshire to maintain supply.
When it gets really serious they have had to resort to stand pipes in
the street.
Looks like this year will be a bumper year for drought orders as there
hasn't been any significant rain here for nearly a month now and we
have have broken record temperatures for May already. Reservoirs in
sensitive areas are at abnormally low levels for this time of year.
We've (here) been in a state of drought for ~25 years.á And, that's
with an normal annual precipitation of ~11 inches.á The shift in mindset
is astonishing -- to go from ~50 in/yr to less than a quarter of that.
And, for it to be confined to just 2.5 months out of the year...
Here, of course (desert southwest), peer pressure and threats of fines >>>> tend to keep folks inline.
The idea of using a garden hose to "sweep" debris off your
driveway or sidewalk would be met with a gasp and a glare.
Fair enough. Where I live the water supply is the huge Kielder
reservoir built to service a once thriving major steel industry on
Teesside. Even if it didn't rain at all for a year we would still be
on supply.
Next village is on Yorkshire and often get hosepipe bans in summer.
We "store" water in the ground.á The hope being that we can extract
it when the time comes.
There have been some foreign companies exploiting our water supplies
(deep wells to farm and then export the farmed products).á I htink
there is some action being taken to confound this practice.
Yesterday I heard on the news that most cities in the USA are sinking
down, due to water extraction from wells.
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest
run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a
UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it
remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some
power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years.á In probably 80% of
them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery
or battery PACK is difficult.á This is especially true of the "better"
UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design.á Often one has to disassemble
the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last, >> even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements? >>>I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apag≤n. >>
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something
to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells
connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they
were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
There are places where copper products (wire, plumbing) are stolen
for their "recycle value". The solution, so far, has been to
require recyclers to get and record identification of people
bringing in such items.
Not enough, apparently.
The hut they vandalized has a notice board that says all the cables are aluminum.
I think there have been cases of people trying to steal the wiring in
outside lighting systems -- and not taking adequate provisions to
protect against electrocution!
Yeah, here too. They even tried to rip the railway catenary at some place. Some
of those died on the spot.
I would like to make some backlit copper lighted displays for the house
(AZ is The Copper State) but am afraid its oxidized color would attract
some thief eager to make a few dollars off it.
Sigh.
Some places have copper roofs.
25€. A 9Ah item, high discharge rate.
Different grades exist, here. If you buy from an electronics supplier
(e.g., Digikey), you will likely get a "fairer" price (value for money)
than a local battery store (which may be 50% higher). UPS manufacturers
typically charge about double what a reasonable price might be (though
the usually assemble the batteries into the requisite "packs"...
a trivial exercise for even 48V units).
Let me check. The computer place here offers:
Phasak PHB 1209 Batería SAI/UPS 9Ah 12V 29,17€
Salicru UBT 12/9 Batería para SAI/UPS 9aH 12v 18,98€ (was 20,63€)
So the brand name battery replacement for my UPS is actually cheaper than what
I paid. Surprise!
Digikey used to have a policy of free shipping for prepaid (cash)
orders. I would buy batteries in lots of 10 and send prepayment.
Shipping charges can be a significant fraction of a battery's
cost. They now exclude batteries from this policy (when I last
checked).
Right, they are very heavy. Yep, the place above charges 5.25€ for shipping.
I figure whoever specified the fans must have considered
their efficiency so wouldn't want to go playing around
with alternate devices and discover something died
prematurely, as a result.
[And, lots of UPSs available for rescue. I brought home
four 2200VA units two weeks ago and decided to scrap them
as they were double-conversion models. I cut off the
#12AWG power cords and made four "extension cords" from
the set!]
Heh.
On Fri, 9 May 2025 14:18:53 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest >>>>> run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a
UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it
remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some >>>> power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years. In probably 80% of
them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery >>> or battery PACK is difficult. This is especially true of the "better"
UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design. Often one has to disassemble
the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last, >>> even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements? >>>>I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apagón. >>>
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something
to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells
connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they
were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
The were most likely KS-20472 BELLCELL lead-acid battery cells,
originally made by Western Electric, or European equivalent. These
are 2.2 volts per cell.
.<https://library.industrialsolutions.abb.com/publibrary/checkout/107852477?TNR=Installation%20and%20Instruction%7C107852477%7CPDF>
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something
to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells connected in
series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
It's
REALLY inconvenient to have to replace them *now* cuz they
are costly and physically inconvenient to man-handle. I
would much appreciate some advance notice that they are likely
to need replacement in, say, 30 days (given the current usage
pattern).
Maybe folks will start putting more smarts into their product
designs instead of simple "threshold" events.
Some UPS say they can test the battery. Mine do not, or the software I have doesn't.
When looking at specs for a replacement UPS, possibly an Eaton, I saw they mentioned emitting a beep when battery is bad.
On Fri, 9 May 2025 14:18:53 +0200, "Carlos E.R."107852477?TNR=Installation%20and%20Instruction%7C107852477%7CPDF>
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest >>>>> run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a
UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it
remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because
some power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years. In probably 80% of
them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the
battery or battery PACK is difficult. This is especially true of the
"better" UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where
there is little "give" in the mechanical design. Often one has to
disassemble the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery
pack to force it from the case.
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced
replacements?
I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran
Apagón.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will
last,
even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for
something to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells >>connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they >>were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
The were most likely KS-20472 BELLCELL lead-acid battery cells,
originally made by Western Electric, or European equivalent. These are
2.2 volts per cell.
.<https://library.industrialsolutions.abb.com/publibrary/checkout/
Joe
On 5/9/2025 5:18 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
When looking at specs for a replacement UPS, possibly an Eaton, I saw
they mentioned emitting a beep when battery is bad.
They likely don't load test, then. Perhaps just watch the open
circuit voltage on the "charged" battery.
It is distressing how little the technology associated with
battery monitoring and charging has advanced in these sorts
of applications. Again, likely because there is little
incentive to maximize battery life!
On 5/9/2025 5:07 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
There are places where copper products (wire, plumbing) are stolen
for their "recycle value". The solution, so far, has been to
require recyclers to get and record identification of people
bringing in such items.
Not enough, apparently.
The hut they vandalized has a notice board that says all the cables
are aluminum.
I wonder if the would-be thieves even bother to READ...
I think there have been cases of people trying to steal the wiring in
outside lighting systems -- and not taking adequate provisions to
protect against electrocution!
Yeah, here too. They even tried to rip the railway catenary at some
place. Some of those died on the spot.
How much "protection" do you think a SIGN would provide? "Hey, Bob,
don't these got electricity in them?"
I would like to make some backlit copper lighted displays for the house
(AZ is The Copper State) but am afraid its oxidized color would attract
some thief eager to make a few dollars off it.
Sigh.
Some places have copper roofs.
Yes. We had looked into it (because it is far more durable than
virtually any other roofing material in common use, here (including
tile). But, you need a minimum pitch to ensure the water doesn't
pool on the roof.
25€. A 9Ah item, high discharge rate.
Different grades exist, here. If you buy from an electronics supplier
(e.g., Digikey), you will likely get a "fairer" price (value for money)
than a local battery store (which may be 50% higher). UPS manufacturers >>> typically charge about double what a reasonable price might be (though
the usually assemble the batteries into the requisite "packs"...
a trivial exercise for even 48V units).
Let me check. The computer place here offers:
Phasak PHB 1209 Batería SAI/UPS 9Ah 12V 29,17€
Salicru UBT 12/9 Batería para SAI/UPS 9aH 12v 18,98€ (was 20,63€) >>
So the brand name battery replacement for my UPS is actually cheaper
than what I paid. Surprise!
The nominal 12V 7.2AHr batteries (also available at 9AHr in the same
case size) that many of my UPSs use are ~20-30, here, neglecting
shipping and tax. Putting two (for smaller UPSs) or 4 in each UPS
gets pricey -- if you have to do it every 3 years (and have a dozen
UPSs)!
I've tried a new configuration where I am hanging many of the
UPSs off a couple of larger units. The thinking being that I
only have to maintain the larger units' batteries (and still
get the benefits of a UPS per workstation).
Digikey used to have a policy of free shipping for prepaid (cash)
orders. I would buy batteries in lots of 10 and send prepayment.
Shipping charges can be a significant fraction of a battery's
cost. They now exclude batteries from this policy (when I last
checked).
Right, they are very heavy. Yep, the place above charges 5.25€ for
shipping.
As I said, I try to rescue them (often I come across NiB UPSs
that some moron in IT ordered but opted not to install.
As the recycle value of batteries is just weight (regardless of
ability to hold a charge), I swap my dead batteries for such
new batteries and everyone is happy!
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many of those use
aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could hold a pool.
I've tried a new configuration where I am hanging many of the
UPSs off a couple of larger units. The thinking being that I
only have to maintain the larger units' batteries (and still
get the benefits of a UPS per workstation).
Maybe just a big unit, and wiring around the place. Red coloured sockets. Lilke
in computer centres.
Digikey used to have a policy of free shipping for prepaid (cash)
orders. I would buy batteries in lots of 10 and send prepayment.
Shipping charges can be a significant fraction of a battery's
cost. They now exclude batteries from this policy (when I last
checked).
Right, they are very heavy. Yep, the place above charges 5.25€ for shipping.
As I said, I try to rescue them (often I come across NiB UPSs
that some moron in IT ordered but opted not to install.
As the recycle value of batteries is just weight (regardless of
ability to hold a charge), I swap my dead batteries for such
new batteries and everyone is happy!
:-D
On 2025-05-09 23:41, Don Y wrote:
On 5/9/2025 5:18 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
...
When looking at specs for a replacement UPS, possibly an Eaton, I saw they >>> mentioned emitting a beep when battery is bad.
They likely don't load test, then. Perhaps just watch the open
circuit voltage on the "charged" battery.
It is distressing how little the technology associated with
battery monitoring and charging has advanced in these sorts
of applications. Again, likely because there is little
incentive to maximize battery life!
At my garage they have some gadgetry that I have not seen to test batteries. I
saw the one at the battery shop. I assume they put some calibrated load on the
battery and measure both voltage and current, and make some estimate on battery
life. The one at my garage has a printer, I got the paper slip somewhere.
On 2025-05-09 18:22, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Fri, 9 May 2025 14:18:53 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest >>>>>> run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a >>>>>> UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it
remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some >>>>> power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years.á In probably 80% of >>>> them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery >>>> or battery PACK is difficult.á This is especially true of the "better" >>>> UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design.á Often one has to disassemble
the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last,They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements? >>>>>I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apag≤n. >>>>
even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something >>>> to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells
connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they >>> were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
The were most likely KS-20472 BELLCELL lead-acid battery cells,
originally made by Western Electric, or European equivalent. These
are 2.2 volts per cell.
.<https://library.industrialsolutions.abb.com/publibrary/checkout/107852477?TNR=Installation%20and%20Instruction%7C107852477%7CPDF>
Those I saw were prismatic, not cylindrical.
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many of
those use aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could hold a pool.
Sadly, organic debris accumulates on them. Then, water gets trapped
in the debris -- and slowly rots the roof in that location. Drainage
being important and hard to accomplish with low pitch.
I've tried a new configuration where I am hanging many of the
UPSs off a couple of larger units. The thinking being that I
only have to maintain the larger units' batteries (and still
get the benefits of a UPS per workstation).
Maybe just a big unit, and wiring around the place. Red coloured
sockets. Lilke in computer centres.
Wiring *in* the structure would necessitate an inspection.
But, plugging three UPSs (with long power cords) into a
single UPS is acceptable. Then, the single UPS can
serve those three loads or any combination.
ONE set of batteries to replace (let the other three "slaves"
complain that they are missing batteries... who cares?!)
Digikey used to have a policy of free shipping for prepaid (cash)
orders. I would buy batteries in lots of 10 and send prepayment.
Shipping charges can be a significant fraction of a battery's
cost. They now exclude batteries from this policy (when I last
checked).
Right, they are very heavy. Yep, the place above charges 5.25€ for
shipping.
As I said, I try to rescue them (often I come across NiB UPSs
that some moron in IT ordered but opted not to install.
As the recycle value of batteries is just weight (regardless of
ability to hold a charge), I swap my dead batteries for such
new batteries and everyone is happy!
:-D
An SLA battery is worth about 22c/pound for its lead content.
So, *taking* viable batteries is effectively theft (though on
a very small scale). Replacing them with an equivalent
weight of recyclable lead leave no grounds for objection:
"How better to RECYCLE this *good* battery than to return it
to service?!"
On Fri, 9 May 2025 23:28:29 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-09 18:22, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Fri, 9 May 2025 14:18:53 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest >>>>>>> run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a >>>>>>> UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support
metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it >>>>>>> remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some >>>>>> power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years. In probably 80% of >>>>> them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery >>>>> or battery PACK is difficult. This is especially true of the "better" >>>>> UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design. Often one has to disassemble >>>>> the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5
months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apagón.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last,
even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something >>>>> to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells
connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they >>>> were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
The were most likely KS-20472 BELLCELL lead-acid battery cells,
originally made by Western Electric, or European equivalent. These
are 2.2 volts per cell.
.<https://library.industrialsolutions.abb.com/publibrary/checkout/107852477?TNR=Installation%20and%20Instruction%7C107852477%7CPDF>
Those I saw were prismatic, not cylindrical.
OK. Later production is rectangular, largely to improve packing
density in the battery room.
The key was the nested alternating conical battery plates that allowed
the plates to grow and shrink without shorting.
On 2025-05-10 04:37, Don Y wrote:
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many of those >>> use aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could hold a pool.
Sadly, organic debris accumulates on them. Then, water gets trapped
in the debris -- and slowly rots the roof in that location. Drainage
being important and hard to accomplish with low pitch.
The intense sun dries it up soon :-)
ONE set of batteries to replace (let the other three "slaves"
complain that they are missing batteries... who cares?!)
Why not remove those three UPS, and connect the loads direct to the main UPS? :-?
On 2025-05-10 14:03, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Fri, 9 May 2025 23:28:29 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-09 18:22, Joe Gwinn wrote:
On Fri, 9 May 2025 14:18:53 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
On 2025-05-08 23:57, Don Y wrote:
That is a feature of UPS design that specsmanship to get the longest >>>>>>>> run time for the sales datasheet means that they cook their
batteries. I have seen them swell to the point of bursting inside a >>>>>>>> UPS. Thick rubber gloves needed to remove the remains. Support >>>>>>>> metalwork was a real corroded rusty mess but electronics above it >>>>>>>> remained OK.
That level of "not working" has not happened to me. Maybe because some >>>>>>> power failure makes me find out that the battery is dead.
I've rescued a fair number of UPSs over the years.á In probably 80% of >>>>>> them, the batteries have swollen to the point where removing the battery >>>>>> or battery PACK is difficult.á This is especially true of the "better" >>>>>> UPSs (sine output, 48V battery, metal fabrication) where there is
little "give" in the mechanical design.á Often one has to disassemble >>>>>> the UPS to see where one can gain leverage on the battery pack
to force it from the case.
They really think I'm going to buy their vastly overpriced replacements?
I don't.
But last battery I replaced was not even two years old, rather 5 >>>>>>> months short. I replaced it just in time to serve during the Gran Apag≤n.
That's the problem; you don't KNOW how long a particular battery will last,
even in an environment where it is never called on for backup!
Instead, you are forced into a "reactive" mode -- waiting for something >>>>>> to tell you you're screwed and need a replacement, now!
My largest UPS uses 50 pound batteries (8 of them).
Are they 12 volts each, or just one cell?
On phone exchanges I saw huge batteries, actually individual cells
connected in series. 48 volts nominally, so 24 cells. I don't think they >>>>> were gel types, they needed adding water now and then.
The were most likely KS-20472 BELLCELL lead-acid battery cells,
originally made by Western Electric, or European equivalent. These
are 2.2 volts per cell.
.<https://library.industrialsolutions.abb.com/publibrary/checkout/107852477?TNR=Installation%20and%20Instruction%7C107852477%7CPDF>
Those I saw were prismatic, not cylindrical.
OK. Later production is rectangular, largely to improve packing
density in the battery room.
The key was the nested alternating conical battery plates that allowed
the plates to grow and shrink without shorting.
I see. That, I do not remember.
On 5/10/2025 7:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-10 04:37, Don Y wrote:
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many of
those use aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could hold a
pool.
Sadly, organic debris accumulates on them. Then, water gets trapped
in the debris -- and slowly rots the roof in that location. Drainage
being important and hard to accomplish with low pitch.
The intense sun dries it up soon :-)
Not with pine needles in a corner of the roof shaded by said tree!
ONE set of batteries to replace (let the other three "slaves"
complain that they are missing batteries... who cares?!)
Why not remove those three UPS, and connect the loads direct to the
main UPS? :-?
Because the power cords of the UPSs are longer than the power cords of
each of the workstations AND THEIR ASSOCIATED PERIPHERALS.
Additionally, the UPS lets me monitor the power consumed by the
attached loads so I can figure out how much I can tax the
upstream UPS (when using multiple workstations)
On 5/9/2025 6:26 PM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-09 23:41, Don Y wrote:
On 5/9/2025 5:18 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
...
When looking at specs for a replacement UPS, possibly an Eaton, I
saw they mentioned emitting a beep when battery is bad.
They likely don't load test, then. Perhaps just watch the open
circuit voltage on the "charged" battery.
It is distressing how little the technology associated with
battery monitoring and charging has advanced in these sorts
of applications. Again, likely because there is little
incentive to maximize battery life!
At my garage they have some gadgetry that I have not seen to test
batteries. I saw the one at the battery shop. I assume they put some
calibrated load on the battery and measure both voltage and current,
and make some estimate on battery life. The one at my garage has a
printer, I got the paper slip somewhere.
Yes. "Load testing". The goal being to determine the maximum
"cold cranking amps" that it can deliver to the starter at
a specific load voltage. There's some magic involved as the
CCA specification pertains to operation at 0C (or 0F? I don't
recall) and chances are, you're not going to be testing at that
temperature.
Cold temperatures impede the efficiency of the battery and, at the
same time, make the mechanical load appear larger. I think they
combine to represent about a 4X performance hit.
On 2025-05-10 18:13, Don Y wrote:
On 5/10/2025 7:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-10 04:37, Don Y wrote:
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many of those
use aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could hold a pool.
Sadly, organic debris accumulates on them. Then, water gets trapped
in the debris -- and slowly rots the roof in that location. Drainage >>>> being important and hard to accomplish with low pitch.
The intense sun dries it up soon :-)
Not with pine needles in a corner of the roof shaded by said tree!
Ok...
ONE set of batteries to replace (let the other three "slaves"
complain that they are missing batteries... who cares?!)
Why not remove those three UPS, and connect the loads direct to the main >>> UPS? :-?
Because the power cords of the UPSs are longer than the power cords of
each of the workstations AND THEIR ASSOCIATED PERIPHERALS.
I'd just use a cable extender.
Additionally, the UPS lets me monitor the power consumed by the
attached loads so I can figure out how much I can tax the
upstream UPS (when using multiple workstations)
Ok, that's a powerful reason :-)
On 5/11/2025 6:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-10 18:13, Don Y wrote:
On 5/10/2025 7:04 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-10 04:37, Don Y wrote:
Yes, of course. Around here we have many flat roofed houses. Many
of those use aluminum foil with asphalt. If well done, it could
hold a pool.
Sadly, organic debris accumulates on them. Then, water gets trapped >>>>> in the debris -- and slowly rots the roof in that location. Drainage >>>>> being important and hard to accomplish with low pitch.
The intense sun dries it up soon :-)
Not with pine needles in a corner of the roof shaded by said tree!
Ok...
Most frontier style roofs, here, have a wall that surrounds the
roof (three sides) above the roof level. So, there is always a
dead spot where debris accumulates (you can see it swirl in these
little pockets as the wind blows).
And, depending on the season, the sun may be lower in the sky
thus creating a permanent shadow near that wall.
We have one "bad spot" where I regularly "harvest" 20-30 cubic
feet of pine needles, several times each year. I use a "snow
shovel" to lift them up over that wall and down onto the ground,
below, where I can later rake them up and discard them.
Pine needles acidify the "solution" formed when wet.
ONE set of batteries to replace (let the other three "slaves"
complain that they are missing batteries... who cares?!)
Why not remove those three UPS, and connect the loads direct to the
main UPS? :-?
Because the power cords of the UPSs are longer than the power cords of
each of the workstations AND THEIR ASSOCIATED PERIPHERALS.
I'd just use a cable extender.
You need to have multiple receptacles on the load end as there
are multiple loads to be plugged to each UPS. I.e., use an
outlet strip. Hey! A UPS can act as an outlet strip! :>
The UPS per workstation was a handy approach as it let me power down
(or up) everything that the workstation would typically need,
beyond just the "CPU". E.g., scanners, digitizing tablets,
external drives, etc.
Additionally, the UPS lets me monitor the power consumed by the
attached loads so I can figure out how much I can tax the
upstream UPS (when using multiple workstations)
Ok, that's a powerful reason :-)
Not with pine needles in a corner of the roof shaded by said tree!
Ok...
Most frontier style roofs, here, have a wall that surrounds the
roof (three sides) above the roof level. So, there is always a
dead spot where debris accumulates (you can see it swirl in these
little pockets as the wind blows).
And, depending on the season, the sun may be lower in the sky
thus creating a permanent shadow near that wall.
We have one "bad spot" where I regularly "harvest" 20-30 cubic
feet of pine needles, several times each year. I use a "snow
shovel" to lift them up over that wall and down onto the ground,
below, where I can later rake them up and discard them.
Pine needles acidify the "solution" formed when wet.
I had a place near the beach with such a flat roof. No pines over there.
Because the power cords of the UPSs are longer than the power cords of >>>> each of the workstations AND THEIR ASSOCIATED PERIPHERALS.
I'd just use a cable extender.
You need to have multiple receptacles on the load end as there
are multiple loads to be plugged to each UPS. I.e., use an
outlet strip. Hey! A UPS can act as an outlet strip! :>
The UPS per workstation was a handy approach as it let me power down
(or up) everything that the workstation would typically need,
beyond just the "CPU". E.g., scanners, digitizing tablets,
external drives, etc.
Sure, yes. My extenders have multiple receptacles, typically 3, and 5 metres. There are many choices in the supermarket or in Amazon. Many have a switch. Some of them have surge protection and filtering.