Oahu's electrical power issues

[helen]

I'm saying there's an alternative to putting power lines over a campus with 20,000+ students' heads at UH.

I don't even want to get into energy-related arguments--especially if it deals with Hawaii's electric companies. But anyway, I'm sorry for going off-topic from this thread.

Might as well make a new thread on this topic considering what happen on October 15, 2006 following the aftermath of an earthquake that triggered the shutdown of 2 generators on Oahu which in turned caused an island wide blackout that lasted for some people the entire day and well into the night.

Certainly this isn't the first time an island wide blackout has happened nor would it be the last time.

If you want to share your experinces of October 15, 2006 please use the thead titled Shake and Quake! (http://www.hawaiithreads.com/showthread.php?t=10657) in the Mixed Plate (http://www.hawaiithreads.com/forumdisplay.php?f=59) subforum.

The focus of this thread will be discussing about how electrical power is generated, distrubted, used and/or charged on Oahu. If want to suggest better ways to do things, while it's okay to place it here, your best action is to notify the apporiate group for your suggestion (like HECO or the PUC for instance).

[Miulang]

Here's some information on the entire US's power grid (http://www.solcomhouse.com/uspowergid.htm)situation. Even though the stats are from 1995, virtually nothing has changed in terms of infrastructure or capacity (the main whoops was Enron).

There are 3 consortiums on the CONUS who can trade energy among themselves and divert power when needed. Hawai'i and Alaska, unfortunately, do not have that luxury.

One other interesting thing is that all the different regional power grids may not be hooked into each other in a way that would allow power from one grid to smoothly get to a grid that needs it. They say that the huge regional power outages on the East Coast and midwest were caused by circuits which couldn't handle the power that was being sent to them; in other words, they crashed because there was too much power coming over the lines.

The grid systems in Hawaii and Alaska are much different than on the U.S. mainland. Alaska has an interconnected grid system, but it connects only Anchorage, Fairbanks, and the Kenai Peninsula. Much of the rest of the state depends on small diesel generators, although there are a few minigrids in the state as well. Hawaii also depends on minigrids to serve each island's inhabitants.

Miulang

[Miulang]

The price tag to build a completely redundant power system for Oahu (http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061019/NEWS01/610190341)would be around $1 billion. Would Honolulu citizens want to pay an average of $3,400 per HECO account to ensure that there are no more lengthy power failures? Hawai'i already has the highest electrical rates in the country. Perhaps it would be better to just accept that things like this happen every now and then and just make sure you have adequate supplies for when the power does go out again.

Miulang

[Hellbent]

How about we spend it on solar electric panels, wind, kite gen, or other means of power generation?

[Glen Miyashiro]

Yeah. That much money could go a long way towards renewables and efficiency upgrades and decentralization!

[i-hungry]

1) That article about redundant power system is missing the point. Its not that the people demand 24/7 power available. Its the length of time it takes to get power back. More so for a system that didn't have any damage.

Didn't the other islands get their power back a lot faster? Its obvious that Oahu has more requirements because of the larger population how much longer should the wait be?

2) I am wondering why the earthquake shaking is a criteria for the generators to shutdown. I can understand if it was something electricity related like a surge but physical movement? It would be different if it was the water supply because water will leak out of a broken system and flood the area. Even gas lines are problem because it could collect and be explosive. But electricity?

One could say it should shutdown because there might be damage. But is it going to be any or much different then when its not shutdown?

Wouldn't a manual shutdown be better?

[Glen Miyashiro]

I heard that another factor in the difference between Oʻahu and the other islands is that the other islands' generators are basically huge diesel engines, which are pretty quick to restart. By contrast, the big generators here are steam turbines, which take a lot longer to bring on line.

[Miulang]

Maui's main power generators are also electric turbines, but one of the reasons why power was restored quickly to Maui residents is because the Puunene Sugar Mill (http://www.mauinews.com/story.aspx?id=24314)was able to divert some of its power to help restart the turbine in Kahului. Hana's power wasn't disrupted at all because they have several diesel generators. Too bad all of Oahu's sugar plantations are no more.:(

Miulang

[i-hungry]

I heard that another factor in the difference between Oʻahu and the other islands is that the other islands' generators are basically huge diesel engines, which are pretty quick to restart. By contrast, the big generators here are steam turbines, which take a lot longer to bring on line.

Having some diesel engines on Oahu would be a good. Maybe not to replace all of the generators but have some to backup the Aloha Tower station and maybe the Kahe station.

Its a lot better than spending a billion on a redundant system which may shutdown like the current system. Would the redundant system take just as long to restart too? Who needs two sets of out-of-commision steam generator systems? :rolleyes:

[joshuatree]

2) I am wondering why the earthquake shaking is a criteria for the generators to shutdown. I can understand if it was something electricity related like a surge but physical movement? It would be different if it was the water supply because water will leak out of a broken system and flood the area. Even gas lines are problem because it could collect and be explosive. But electricity?

One could say it should shutdown because there might be damage. But is it going to be any or much different then when its not shutdown?

Wouldn't a manual shutdown be better?

I think the danger is in the fuel. Say the generator is powered by combustion of oil. So if there's an earthquake, maybe the oil fuel line might rupture and spread all over and ignite?

An auto shutdown is safer in case there's no one or no one can get to the controls.

[joshuatree]

The price tag to build a completely redundant power system for Oahu (http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061019/NEWS01/610190341)would be around $1 billion. Would Honolulu citizens want to pay an average of $3,400 per HECO account to ensure that there are no more lengthy power failures? Hawai'i already has the highest electrical rates in the country. Perhaps it would be better to just accept that things like this happen every now and then and just make sure you have adequate supplies for when the power does go out again.

Miulang

I don't think it's wise to spend all that money in building a redundant power system for Oahu. I don't think anyone is upset that the power went off due to a natural disaster but rather why it took so long to bring it back up considering Oahu escaped the earthquake with little to none damage.

It be nice if Oahu looked into using solar powered street lights. At least the streets could have been lit that night when power was still just coming back on.

[i-hungry]

I read today that HECO manually turned off the generators. The alarms went off during the earthquake and the operators followed procedure to turn it off. Its part of their training.

[craigwatanabe]

I read today that HECO manually turned off the generators. The alarms went off during the earthquake and the operators followed procedure to turn it off. Its part of their training.

But 16-hours to turn them back on? I don't think getting back online should take that long. If it does something's definately wrong with HECO.

And why don't we go alternative? NIMBY that's why, remember the Kahuku wind farm? "Ugly" is what those living neaby said. To me that's a beautiful sight to see, harnessing nature's power for the benefit of mankind.

We could go on and on about what kind of alternative energy sources are abundant here in Hawaii and for every one of them you'll find one or more organizations out there trying to stop it.

The very people wanting to save our environment are killing all of us because they are keeping us from weening off of our dependency on oil burning plants.

That's the bottom line. Waahila would have provided an alternative routing of electrical needs for Honolulu but the view would have been destroyed. these protesters wanted these lines buried.

Buried! Can you imagine trenching along the Koolau's? Instead of leaving small footprints for each transmission tower, entire lengths of flora from start to finish would have been destroyed in the attempt to trench and bury massive powerlines. And then what happens when there's a break in power somewhere along that buried line? Just like Kapiolani BLVD, the area gets torn up to fix it, destroying whatever growth that reclaimed the land again.

Like Star Trek's Scotty telling Captain Kirk: I'm giving you all the power I can Captain but these dialithium crystals just can't take it any longer.

Pretty soon more transmission lines have to be built, more power plants have to be built, alternative power supplies have to be found and built. In other words more has to be built. The other option is to start having less and stop developing so more can't live here.

Oahu's island living is demanding more more more but those damned crystals just can't take it anymore. Either Oahu provides for more or start to reduce it's demand for electricity. In either scenerio, nobody's gonna want to conserve or leave.

I did both. I left Oahu and because of our extremely high cost of electricitiy here I conserve like crazy. I'm actually looking at photovoltaic panels and solar water heating. Both are expensive but both should pay for themselves over a period of time.

[shazz]

Electricity is obscenely expensive here. HECO is making so much money, they should be required to invest in a system that has more redundancy. Who is on the PUC and what are their ties to HECO?

[craigwatanabe]

Electricity is obscenely expensive here. HECO is making so much money, they should be required to invest in a system that has more redundancy. Who is on the PUC and what are their ties to HECO?

You want obscene, try Kauai or the Big Island. Horrendously higher than on Oahu.

[Mike_Lowery]

You want obscene, try Kauai or the Big Island. Horrendously higher than on Oahu.

Co-sign. And with all the coin they're making, improvements and introduction of new technology is sloooooooow.

[GnosticWarrior]

There was an article in Sunday's Honolulu Advertiser about this company Sky WindPower. (http://www.skywindpower.com/ww/index.htm) Seems like this Flying Electrical Generator would do pretty well with our trade winds. I think it makes sense to try and capture the power of high altitude wind. This FEG coupled with EV's with Vehicle-To-Grid technology (http://www.acpropulsion.com/technology/v2g.htm) would really help Hawaii be less oil dependent.