ERCOT, PUC, and deregulation got us here

[TwiceHorn 31311]

34 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

I thought you were a lawyer this whole time. Huh.

Por que no los dos?

There are several of us.

Edited February 19, 2021 by TwiceHorn

[gmr548 16529]

He is both. He lives in that in between world known as patent law. Or, at least that has been my understanding. 

[TwiceHorn 31311]

13 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

He is both. He lives in that in between world known as patent law. Or, at least that has been my understanding. 

[TwiceHorn 31311]

12 minutes ago, FondrenRoad said:

He said engineer though. Are you saying he doesn't drive trains?

I would very much like to drive a train and did once for about a minute when I was about 8.

I would not like to pull any trains, however.

[hayden_horn 11360]

40 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Nevertheless, from a purely technical standpoint, these comparisons of other states and their grids is unfair unless comparing at "black swan" departures from "normal."

i once again go back to my point about homeowner's insurance and floodplains. when you live in a 100 year floodplain, you pay more. i'm tired of this being designated as a black swan.

when we talk about utilities, i think preparation for "black swan" is important. it is not fucking unreasonable to pose a scenario of multiple days below freezing in texas. we've had winter weather before. it's fucked our shit up before. we know it doesn't happen often, but just because it doesn't happen often is not a reason to not prepare. that's my biggest frustration with this. in a state full of "off the grid prepper republicans" we get fucked by the apocalypse more often than not. today, i've got to venture out for beer and wine, and i guess some kind of food, and the shelves are going to be fucking barren. i've got two pots of water boiling on my stove and my brother in law and his family coming over to fucking shower in our low pressure bathrooms because they've been without any kind of water for three fucking days. we're fortunate to have had power and water for the past week, so we're giving back as best we can, but fucking hell. 

this shit ain't right. some heads need to roll. the idea of "black swan" is a substitute in my mind for "lack of any kind of foresight."

 

[MoJames 8241]

2 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

The b1351 variant is a pretty significant mutation that has shown ability to escape existing vaccines to varying extents. It is clearly capable of changing significantly and fast enough to matter. It’s not like we’re back to square one - the MRNAs are still very good and J&J was solid in cutting the more severe outcomes - but to just be willfully dismissive of that is not a credible take.

Of course that will happen, but it takes a long time, costs a lot of unnecessary lives, severe illnesses, and healthcare resources. It also affords the virus the opportunity to mutate further to the point that it has a really significant impact on efficacy of existing vaccines. It’s not a desirable outcome, because it extends the timeline and toll of this a long way out, even if it’s the most likely course.

Last post on it bc this isn't about the vaccine. My point is only that we will not have a similar long term approach to SARS-CoV-2 as we do to Influenza as someone above suggested simply based on the etiology of the virus.

[TwiceHorn 31311]

8 minutes ago, hayden_horn said:

i once again go back to my point about homeowner's insurance and floodplains. when you live in a 100 year floodplain, you pay more. i'm tired of this being designated as a black swan.

when we talk about utilities, i think preparation for "black swan" is important. it is not fucking unreasonable to pose a scenario of multiple days below freezing in texas. we've had winter weather before. it's fucked our shit up before. we know it doesn't happen often, but just because it doesn't happen often is not a reason to not prepare. that's my biggest frustration with this. in a state full of "off the grid prepper republicans" we get fucked by the apocalypse more often than not. today, i've got to venture out for beer and wine, and i guess some kind of food, and the shelves are going to be fucking barren. i've got two pots of water boiling on my stove and my brother in law and his family coming over to fucking shower in our low pressure bathrooms because they've been without any kind of water for three fucking days. we're fortunate to have had power and water for the past week, so we're giving back as best we can, but fucking hell. 

this shit ain't right. some heads need to roll. the idea of "black swan" is a substitute in my mind for "lack of any kind of foresight."

 

I don't disagree, for the record, but this is moving in that sort of "policy" direction.  That is, is it something sufficiently likely that you should plan for it.

I also tend to believe that the state's response was largely to barely lift a finger rather than a reasoned calculation of cost, benefit, and probability.

All I'm saying in that particular post is that, from a technical standpoint, the further you deviate from "normal," the more difficult it is to prepare adequately  and avoid risk.  You could go ask Iowans or Minnesotans how to prepare, but their equipment was designed and built with different standards in mind and the "translation" is not going to be "accurate," and so on.

And there's probably a temperature/condition threshold below which it stops mattering much.  So, if the upper midwest designs their equipment to function in sub-freezing environments for weeks at a time, and weatherizes accordingly, it doesn't much matter if it's 10 above or 10 below.

Edited February 19, 2021 by TwiceHorn

[Goredho 17355]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

Yeah, I don't know whether ERCOT should be empowered to do these things or the governor, or what I think it is, the lege.

ERCOT presumably has the expertise and can move fastest, but is the least accountable.  Governor lacks expertise, can move fast, and is accountable.  Lege lacks expertise, moves slow, and is accountable.

Totally agree with your last paragraph.

I just don't see how the governor or the lege would have the ability to adequately monitor what the different principals in the Texas power grid are doing.  I think they have to delegate that to a regulatory body who's only job is to be an expert on power grids, enact regulations to safeguard the public interest and has enough authority to enforce them.

There are a lot of different areas where something like that needs to exist.  We are just talking about "energy grid" right now because that is where we are feeling pain.  But it needs to exist for all kinds of shit and no individual like the Governor could have the expertise or time to police them all.

[Beau Vine 54012]

2 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

And then there's this asshole.  https://house.texas.gov/news/press-releases/?id=7325

The least surprising thing on that link:

Quote

His family resides in Frisco.

 

[WhatTheBuck 28719]

16 minutes ago, MoJames said:

Last post on it bc this isn't about the vaccine. My point is only that we will not have a similar long term approach to SARS-CoV-2 as we do to Influenza as someone above suggested simply based on the etiology of the virus.

You said one virus is more prone to mutation than another. I question whether you know what you’re talking about, especially when the virus you say is less prone to mutation is barely more than a year old and has already undergone at least two mutations that provided it with a competitive advantage. We don’t know how many neutral or negative mutations have occurred. Genes mutate. That’s unavoidable. The novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is too new to make any firm predictions about immunity, the effectiveness of vaccines, or what mutations may be still to come.

[TwiceHorn 31311]

12 minutes ago, Beau Vine said:

The least surprising thing on that link:

 

I refrained from saying anything about that, but noticed.  The home of the fightin coons is very problematic for reasons other than coons.

[TwiceHorn 31311]

15 minutes ago, Goredho said:

I just don't see how the governor or the lege would have the ability to adequately monitor what the different principals in the Texas power grid are doing.  I think they have to delegate that to a regulatory body who's only job is to be an expert on power grids, enact regulations to safeguard the public interest and has enough authority to enforce them.

There are a lot of different areas where something like that needs to exist.  We are just talking about "energy grid" right now because that is where we are feeling pain.  But it needs to exist for all kinds of shit and no individual like the Governor could have the expertise or time to police them all.

Yep, we need an administrative state.  But it comes with its own problems.   I'm seeing that some of the new bills direct ERCOT to promulgate rules and policies, etc.  In some ways, that feels like a copout, but it's probably better than having fools like Jared Patterson make the rules/laws.

[hayden_horn 11360]

28 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

I don't disagree, for the record, but this is moving in that sort of "policy" direction.  That is, is it something sufficiently likely that you should plan for it.

I also tend to believe that the state's response was largely to barely lift a finger rather than a reasoned calculation of cost, benefit, and probability.

All I'm saying in that particular post is that, from a technical standpoint, the further you deviate from "normal," the more difficult it is to prepare adequately  and avoid risk.  You could go ask Iowans or Minnesotans how to prepare, but their equipment was designed and built with different standards in mind and the "translation" is not going to be "accurate," and so on.

And there's probably a temperature/condition threshold below which it stops mattering much.  So, if the upper midwest designs their equipment to function in sub-freezing environments for weeks at a time, and weatherizes accordingly, it doesn't much matter if it's 10 above or 10 below.

to be clear, i wasn't coming at you in my post. i think we agree. i only took exception to the burgeoning "black swan event" terminology. a real black swan, as i stated earlier is ten tornadoes at once. we can't help that. back to back hurricanes. we can't help that. our power and water utilities, we are firmly in charge of these, and we have a way to make sure this doesn't happen. that we didn't is the big crime here. inductive reasoning as policy is fucking terrible policy.

[Biff Tannen 45506]

1 hour ago, sidis said:

The legislature is going to save us? This guy?

I don't really believe he's a real person.  He looks like a got damn cartoon character.  No real human would present themselves to the world this way.

[Goredho 17355]

3 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

I don't really believe he's a real person.  He looks like a got damn cartoon character.  No real human would present themselves to the world this way.

All hat, no testicle

[TwiceHorn 31311]

23 minutes ago, hayden_horn said:

to be clear, i wasn't coming at you in my post. i think we agree. i only took exception to the burgeoning "black swan event" terminology. a real black swan, as i stated earlier is ten tornadoes at once. we can't help that. back to back hurricanes. we can't help that. our power and water utilities, we are firmly in charge of these, and we have a way to make sure this doesn't happen. that we didn't is the big crime here. inductive reasoning as policy is fucking terrible policy.

Yeah, one of the problems here is, no matter how unlikely the occurrence, the cost would be measured in lives, not just dollars and that should mean that the low probability can't be dismissed.

[WhatTheBuck 28719]

19 minutes ago, Goredho said:

All sack, no testicle

Fify

[Ojo Rojo 1908]

18 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

I don't really believe he's a real person.  He looks like a got damn cartoon character.  No real human would present themselves to the world this way.

Same.  He looks to be about 17 years old in this picture.  And what's up with those glasses?  He just looks like a smarmy turd.  Very punchable face.

[Dahobbs 17454]

2 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Yeah, one of the problems here is, no matter how unlikely the occurrence, the cost would be measured in lives, not just dollars and that should mean that the low probability can't be dismissed.

It isn't even that low of a probability, and that is my problem. We've had freezes before. Preparing for a 100 or 500 year event isn't unreasonable, especially when you're talking about critical infrastructure for millions of people.  And this seemed more like a 20 year event. Spending a few hundred million to winterize everything is a fucking bargain compared to what just happened. 

[elfenix 34189]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

Nevertheless, from a purely technical standpoint, these comparisons of other states and their grids is unfair unless comparing at "black swan" departures from "normal."

issue being that because we burn fossil fuels these black swans are instead regular swans.  sure, there's more ducks and geese out on the pond still but there's plenty of swans as well. 

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4968]

1 hour ago, hayden_horn said:

i once again go back to my point about homeowner's insurance and floodplains. when you live in a 100 year floodplain, you pay more. i'm tired of this being designated as a black swan.

when we talk about utilities, i think preparation for "black swan" is important. it is not fucking unreasonable to pose a scenario of multiple days below freezing in texas. we've had winter weather before. it's fucked our shit up before. we know it doesn't happen often, but just because it doesn't happen often is not a reason to not prepare. that's my biggest frustration with this. in a state full of "off the grid prepper republicans" we get fucked by the apocalypse more often than not. today, i've got to venture out for beer and wine, and i guess some kind of food, and the shelves are going to be fucking barren. i've got two pots of water boiling on my stove and my brother in law and his family coming over to fucking shower in our low pressure bathrooms because they've been without any kind of water for three fucking days. we're fortunate to have had power and water for the past week, so we're giving back as best we can, but fucking hell. 

this shit ain't right. some heads need to roll. the idea of "black swan" is a substitute in my mind for "lack of any kind of foresight."

 

There is a bug difference in multiple days below freezing and multiple days ten degrees below zero. Especially from an operations standpoint in a plant. A week below freezing, but staying in the 20's is pretty easy to winterize and prepare for. Most of these places put out enough heat from all equipment that they can handle a few freezing days no problem. You try to drain anything that is supposed to have water and do a handful of stuff just like you do at your house.

But you get an event like this with temps below zero and highs that would typically be pretty cold lows, well all kinds of crap starts to happen that nobody had any idea would happen. It's not like most folks and their houses did much better. It seems like half of Texas had pipes burst, pretty much all of it preventable if you want to toss around unlimited money. The fact is we don't have any institutional knowledge on how to deal with something like this.

If we really want to prepare our power grid for something like this, we have to import people who have experience with stuff like this. Basically, we have to fire our entire electric grid and kidnap the entire upper midwest's workforce. This is the way.

[Foosters 17750]

Its like none of you ever played Sim City.

[hayden_horn 11360]

21 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

It isn't even that low of a probability, and that is my problem. We've had freezes before. Preparing for a 100 or 500 year event isn't unreasonable, especially when you're talking about critical infrastructure for millions of people.  And this seemed more like a 20 year event. Spending a few hundred million to winterize everything is a fucking bargain compared to what just happened. 

that's where i'm living as well. this wasn't completely inconceivable. and the worst part is that the failure largely didn't happen when the event was prolonged. it was nearly immediate, and that's the real indictment. i know we can say things like "texas doesn't often get 6-7 consecutive days of freezing weather" sure. this shit went down in the early hours of monday fucking morning, the night it went below 10 degrees. it wasn't consecutive nights of sub 10 degree weather. it was one fucking night and shit went down. you get some leeway when the extreme event is prolonged, and the stress on the system is too much. and we KNEW that sub 10 degree night was forecast already. it didn't just happen suddenly, without warning. it's like we got the hurricane warning a week before and didn't board up our fucking windows. 

[Js1 85142]

3 minutes ago, Foosters said:

Its like none of you ever played Sim City.

I was really bad at keeping my city powered properly in Sim City 2K. 

I'll be submitting my resume to ERCOT by the end of today. 

[Pato del Muerto 52354]

37 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Yeah, one of the problems here is, no matter how unlikely the occurrence, the cost would be measured in lives, not just dollars and that should mean that the low probability can't be dismissed.

People have no real clue how likely something is if it doesn’t happen regularly. 
 

Texas coast had avoided hurricanes for a few decades back in the late 20th century and suddenly it was “they don’t hit here.”

when sandy hit the northeast coast, all you heard at first from New Yorkers is this isn’t supposed to happen, this never happens!  Then you see a list of hurricanes that have been recorded as hitting New York in the 1800s and early 1900s. Oh. 
 

we as a group seem to downplay the likelihood of bad events, especially weather events. 

[hayden_horn 11360]

7 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

There is a bug difference in multiple days below freezing and multiple days ten degrees below zero. Especially from an operations standpoint in a plant. A week below freezing, but staying in the 20's is pretty easy to winterize and prepare for. Most of these places put out enough heat from all equipment that they can handle a few freezing days no problem. You try to drain anything that is supposed to have water and do a handful of stuff just like you do at your house.

But you get an event like this with temps below zero and highs that would typically be pretty cold lows, well all kinds of crap starts to happen that nobody had any idea would happen. It's not like most folks and their houses did much better. It seems like half of Texas had pipes burst, pretty much all of it preventable if you want to toss around unlimited money. The fact is we don't have any institutional knowledge on how to deal with something like this.

If we really want to prepare our power grid for something like this, we have to import people who have experience with stuff like this. Basically, we have to fire our entire electric grid and kidnap the entire upper midwest's workforce. This is the way.

the grid was overwhelmed the first fucking night of the extreme weather. 

[kevwun 15672]

I posted this in a thread on DT, but am reposting here.  We have had 2 historical floods, a global pandemic and a historical freeze in the last 5 or 6 years.  This shit isn't a black swan event, it's the new reality we live in.  Once in a lifetime insert disaster here has lost all meaning. We can't even seemingly go a year without something historically catastrophic happening. 

[FondrenRoad 4378]

2 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I was really bad at keeping my city powered properly in Sim City 2K. 

I'll be submitting my resume to ERCOT by the end of today. 

Sim City 3 taught me to avoid nuclear plants entirely because once they explode, and they will explode, it makes a quarter of your city unusable forever. Just have to toss the whole thing out and start over. 

[Dahobbs 17454]

16 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

There is a bug difference in multiple days below freezing and multiple days ten degrees below zero. Especially from an operations standpoint in a plant. A week below freezing, but staying in the 20's is pretty easy to winterize and prepare for. Most of these places put out enough heat from all equipment that they can handle a few freezing days no problem. You try to drain anything that is supposed to have water and do a handful of stuff just like you do at your house.

But you get an event like this with temps below zero and highs that would typically be pretty cold lows, well all kinds of crap starts to happen that nobody had any idea would happen. It's not like most folks and their houses did much better. It seems like half of Texas had pipes burst, pretty much all of it preventable if you want to toss around unlimited money. The fact is we don't have any institutional knowledge on how to deal with something like this.

If we really want to prepare our power grid for something like this, we have to import people who have experience with stuff like this. Basically, we have to fire our entire electric grid and kidnap the entire upper midwest's workforce. This is the way.

Do you seriously think comparing an individual's ability to prepare versus industry/the state is relevant at all? For an individual household to prepare for this shit, you'd be talking at least 10k plus per household, requiring each household to independently duplicate critical infrastructure (e.g., generators, gas storage, water storage).  So, easily over 100 billion dollars. Probably several times that actually. I'm pretty fucking confident our critical infrastructure could have been protected for a fraction of that. No shit we might have to import some knowledge. We already knew we needed to do that. It should have been done years ago. Stop making fucking excuses.  No fucking effort was made and that is fucking bullshit. 

Edited February 19, 2021 by Dahobbs

[Dahobbs 17454]

double post

Edited February 19, 2021 by Dahobbs

[elfenix 34189]

27 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

It seems like half of Texas had pipes burst, pretty much all of it preventable if you want to toss around unlimited money.

 

27 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

kidnap the entire upper midwest's workforce.

the upper midwest does not have unlimited money and yet doesn't have pipes freeze. 

fact of the matter is that we've chosen to do things cheap down here.  it wouldn't have taken unlimited money to properly build in avoidance for this, but it would have taken more money than we spent, and god forbid some corporation have to eat into its profits somewhere in this state.

[gsoda3 3237]

14 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

For an individual household to prepare for this shit, you'd be talking at least 10k plus per household,

depends to what level you want to be ready.  

 

to sustain life at the minimal cost wouldn't be too much.  bottled water, 20 pound propane tanks, propane heaters, camping stove, firewood, dry food.  shut off water at the main and you can last for quite a while.  well under $500. 

 

moving up in comfort you could add a generator or two to that list.  another $2,000.  

[wildcat09 29276]

31 minutes ago, Foosters said:

Its like none of you ever played Sim City.

I know how power grids work from playing Cities: Skylines.

[Foosters 17750]

4 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

I know how power grids work from playing Cities: Skylines.

Last one I played looked like this:

On a related note, a few years back when my daughter was an infant, I bought Civilization V on a whim. I developed a literal addiction and my wife would find me in the living room at like 2 am waging war on Ghandi and his dreams of Indian world domination. Ended up just having to delete the game as I was incapable of putting it down. /csb

[fakebusiness 129]

35 minutes ago, kevwun said:

I posted this in a thread on DT, but am reposting here.  We have had 2 historical floods, a global pandemic and a historical freeze in the last 5 or 6 years.  This shit isn't a black swan event, it's the new reality we live in.  Once in a lifetime insert disaster here has lost all meaning. We can't even seemingly go a year without something historically catastrophic happening. 

Statistics show we live in the safest time in human history. 

[Dahobbs 17454]

26 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:

depends to what level you want to be ready.  

 

to sustain life at the minimal cost wouldn't be too much.  bottled water, 20 pound propane tanks, propane heaters, camping stove, firewood, dry food.  shut off water at the main and you can last for quite a while.  well under $500. 

 

moving up in comfort you could add a generator or two to that list.  another $2,000.  

Yeah, I can confirm this is bullshit when dealing with babies, particularly in Texas homes not designed for these temperatures. At any rate, I'm talking about keeping things somewhat near normal and not at maybe you can technically survive. Let's aim higher. 

Edited February 19, 2021 by Dahobbs

[kevwun 15672]

Also, for people in apartments, there's not much prepping they can do.  They have no control over their water and have limited heat options if there's no power.

[gsoda3 3237]

4 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

Yeah, I can confirm this is bullshit when dealing with babies, particularly in Texas homes not designed for these temperatures. At any rate, I'm talking about keeping things somewhat near normal and not at maybe you can technically survive. Let's aim higher. 

 

 

how old are the babies?  what was the toughest part with them? 

 

there's not much you can do to keep life near normal with what we just went through.  once electric goes you're pretty stuck unless you have a huge gas tank as a redundancy or multiple power walls.  

 

 

[cactusflinthead 27595]

https://www.facebook.com/debfordenton/posts/3854842097910744?refid=52&ref=m_notif&notif_t=feed_comment_reply&__tn__=R

ERCOT wants nearly three times the yearly cost of electricity from Denton Municipal Electric for four days.

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4968]

51 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

Do you seriously think comparing an individual's ability to prepare versus industry/the state is relevant at all? For an individual household to prepare for this shit, you'd be talking at least 10k plus per household, requiring each household to independently duplicate critical infrastructure (e.g., generators, gas storage, water storage).  So, easily over 100 billion dollars. Probably several times that actually. I'm pretty fucking confident our critical infrastructure could have been protected for a fraction of that. No shit we might have to import some knowledge. We already knew we needed to do that. It should have been done years ago. Stop making fucking excuses.  No fucking effort was made and that is fucking bullshit. 

The point is that the folks who are working for the energy companies are the same individuals who's pipes froze, same as you. I'm not making excuses, I'm simply saying we shouldn't be trying to crucify a bunch of folks for not being smarter than we were. Yeah, we can learn from this and make things better. But we can also throw 100 billion dollars at it and still see significant outages. Some times we just need to chalk stuff up to "shit happens, and how can we not make it happen again" instead of trying to figure out who to disfigure. 

[Goredho 17355]

Sent to me by someone I know tuned in to the Denton city council meeting.  Prepare thy financial anus.

Edited February 19, 2021 by Goredho
This should be a reply to @cactusflinthead

[crash_davis 23085]

5 minutes ago, cactusflinthead said:

https://www.facebook.com/debfordenton/posts/3854842097910744?refid=52&ref=m_notif&notif_t=feed_comment_reply&__tn__=R

ERCOT wants nearly three times the yearly cost of electricity from Denton Municipal Electric for four days.

no fakebook account. can you post the story?

[Goredho 17355]

1 minute ago, crash_davis said:

no fakebook account. can you post the story?

Look at my pic above.

[jimmyjazz 45585]

13 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:

how old are the babies?  what was the toughest part with them? 

 

there's not much you can do to keep life near normal with what we just went through.  once electric goes you're pretty stuck unless you have a huge gas tank as a redundancy or multiple power walls.  

Well, you can go sit in your car and idle it at a gallon every 8 hours.

I'm not trying to be a dick, but a whole bunch of people could get through the worst of this in terms of temperature if they just knew to keep their cars full of gas and have the ability to move them outdoors.

That said, this whole situation sucks and I am definitely not blaming the victims (many of whom don't own cars).

[crash_davis 23085]

7 minutes ago, Goredho said:

Sent to me by someone I know tuned in to the Denton city council meeting.  Prepare thy financial anus.

Free market bitches!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[jimmyjazz 45585]

11 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

The point is that the folks who are working for the energy companies are the same individuals who's pipes froze, same as you. I'm not making excuses, I'm simply saying we shouldn't be trying to crucify a bunch of folks for not being smarter than we were. Yeah, we can learn from this and make things better. But we can also throw 100 billion dollars at it and still see significant outages. Some times we just need to chalk stuff up to "shit happens, and how can we not make it happen again" instead of trying to figure out who to disfigure. 

No, that's the wrong take, because the decisions were clearly made in favor of profit over safety.

[Dahobbs 17454]

14 minutes ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

The point is that the folks who are working for the energy companies are the same individuals who's pipes froze, same as you. I'm not making excuses, I'm simply saying we shouldn't be trying to crucify a bunch of folks for not being smarter than we were. Yeah, we can learn from this and make things better. But we can also throw 100 billion dollars at it and still see significant outages. Some times we just need to chalk stuff up to "shit happens, and how can we not make it happen again" instead of trying to figure out who to disfigure. 

I'm not saying crucify the workers. I get the conditions were difficult. They were made more difficult because our infrastructure wasn't prepared in advance. There are things to chalk up to "shit happens" and as unavoidable problems: meteor, super volcano, nuclear attack, 50 foot tidal wave, and godzilla. Not on the list, a few days of sub freezing temperatures. We were already warned this was an issue. We knew we needed to address it. We did nothing. That isn't acceptable. 

Edited February 19, 2021 by Dahobbs

[wildcat09 29276]

1 hour ago, Dahobbs said:

Do you seriously think comparing an individual's ability to prepare versus industry/the state is relevant at all? For an individual household to prepare for this shit, you'd be talking at least 10k plus per household, requiring each household to independently duplicate critical infrastructure (e.g., generators, gas storage, water storage).  So, easily over 100 billion dollars. Probably several times that actually. I'm pretty fucking confident our critical infrastructure could have been protected for a fraction of that. No shit we might have to import some knowledge. We already knew we needed to do that. It should have been done years ago. Stop making fucking excuses.  No fucking effort was made and that is fucking bullshit. 

Republicans actually think that's what we should do and tough shit for anyone who can't afford it.

[Dahobbs 17454]

27 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:

 

 

how old are the babies?  what was the toughest part with them? 

 

there's not much you can do to keep life near normal with what we just went through.  once electric goes you're pretty stuck unless you have a huge gas tank as a redundancy or multiple power walls.  

 

 

3 months. Second part: thus my $10k estimate (minimum price for a whole home generator). And thus why I said instead of having every individual household recreate the wheel as  our backup, why not, I don't know, actually make an effort to protect our infrastructure? 

Edited February 19, 2021 by Dahobbs

[wildcat09 29276]

1 minute ago, Dahobbs said:

3 months. Second part: thus my $10k estimate (minimum price for a whole home generator). And thus why I said isn't of having every individual household recreate the wheel as  our backup, why not, I don't know, actually make an effort to protect our infrastructure? 

Because that'd cost extra tax dollars and Republicans don't want to spend any money on helping other people.