by James Wesley Rawles, Survival Blog:

I thought I’d give some insight on the COVID-19 impact from my perspective in the hydroelectric power industry. As a journeyman hydro electrician, I’ll provide a “boots on the ground” tradesman’s point of view. I’ll do my best to give a short- and medium-term interpretation of this event’s impacts insofar as keeping the lights on. While not as prevalent throughout the entire country, hydroelectric projects (dams) are the major supplier of electricity for the bulk of those already in the Redoubt and BC. While all the windmills along the Columbia produce more political “warm and fuzzies” than actual power, dams are the reliable workhorses that make up the Northwest’s power backbone. Reasonable steps are being taken to keep it that way. I cannot and will not speak to the rest of the country, but I would assume CoOP (Continuity of Operations) strategies are being implemented elsewhere and my situation is not unique. Coal, wind, solar, and nuclear have other logistical issues that hopefully someone else can elaborate on.

I work for a major public utility in the Northwest.  There has been no small amount of neither literal nor virtual ink spilled over the recent virus outbreak.  It’s a big deal.  My utility and pretty much every other public and private entity is taking it very seriously.  Almost a fashion statement, I literally just got an e-mail from a car dealership in Spokane saying they’re going on the defense as well.  But think about it: These bosses, whatever we may think of them, have a vested interest in keeping things going as smoothly as possible.  Whether they answer to the shareholders, board, or voters, they’ll all have their day within the next few months.  Dams and the power they produce are a necessity for the grid and most companies recognize them for the cash cows they are.  I’m not saying “Don’t worry, the government has it under control,” but I really don’t think this virus will render my sector with its overarching implications inoperable.

Digest:  E’ry little thing’s gonna be alright.

Don’t worry. I know I’m writing to the SurvivalBlog audience. Doom and gloom may abound, but a power outage isn’t the point to get freaked out about.  Spend your energy trying to get that last corner of your pantry stocked.  I’ve been asked this so many times it prompted a quick letter to the editor that morphed into this article.  You’ll probably still have electricity.  It’s a virus we’re fighting, not electrons and for you and yours, the concerns will most likely be something other than lumens.  That said, things could change over time.  Prepare as so many other articles have instructed.  Whether for an hour, day, or year, I do believe an extended power outage will occur sooner or later but that’s not the pressing issue.  Let me reiterate, I’m writing from an admittedly myopic position at the ground level and can only confidently speak specifically of the northwestern US and possibly BC, but I feel reasonable in projecting this across the rest of the nation.  My contacts at other utilities feel the same.  After getting many late-night panicked texts, I’m relatively confident the dams will still crank out electricity with even 3/4 of the crew out on sick bed.  Let’s take a look at this.

THE HYDROPOWER BASICS

Most hydroelectric dams were built within the past 100 years, or so.  Given the rigorous structural testing involved for FERC re-licensing, which essentially focuses on making sure a dam won’t fail and flood the surrounding area, we’ll ignore other potential points of failure (Malicious software/hacking, Cascadia Rising, Supervolcano, EMP/sunspots, terrorism, etc) and focus strictly on what’s in front of at this point in time.  I do not intend to diminish legitimate concerns; those others are all considerations worth preparing for.  But I’m speaking to this moment, right now.  We’re facing a viral epidemic.  Let’s take a quick look at how power gets from the river to your living room light fixture and how such a virus would affect that light staying on.

Water goes through a pipe, spins a wheel that in turn spins a big ol’ magnet inside a coil of wires.  That coil forces electrons through more coils and then more and more coils, increasing and decreasing the voltage (pressure) in inverse proportion to the current (flow) as necessary, through your breaker panel, to the light switch and to the light.  As much as I’d love to geek out, there’s lots of material all over the web on this so I won’t delve further.  The more basic concern moves beyond principle to the application.  How would a viral pandemic prevent you from getting power to your house?  All of this, the water, rotor (magnet), coils (stators, transformers), are operated, regulated, cooled, lubed, and maintained by people or systems that people or computers directly control.  Let’s look at that.

THROWING A MONKEYWRENCH

For a short-term scenario, let’s make it bad: A couple of operators, machinists, and electricians are out sick.  These are the key personnel.  Most the of the crew is home vacillating whether heads or tails to the porcelain.  Without managers, secretaries, and laborers things might get tough, but the lights stay on.  There’s still a skeleton crew of the essential core present at work during the day shift.  But that’s basically what a powerhouse would have on the weekend anyway.  If manned at all after normal work hours, most powerhouses only have a solo operator on night shift.  The generators do the work.  If everything is going well, the guy running the show is in the control room at their computer and, like most operators I know, he’s reading this article right now.

The generators will most likely be okay for a few days, probably a week or two, possibly months just spinning.  Throughout the decades, powerhouses have run on fewer and fewer people.  The reasons for this are generally the result of financial decisions and automation, both being intertwined.  From the financial standpoint, some power producers have decided to cut the bottom line and employ as few people as possible.  I’ll reserve judgment on ROI here, but that’s what most companies have done.  As for automation, this can potentially obviate the need for a human to be physically present for operation of the generators.  Most small powerhouses run by remote control until something goes wrong.  As long as things keep ticking along, there’s no need for someone to be there.  My powerhouse has a full day shift and retains a night shift operator, but the majority of powerhouses are unmanned except for maintenance or trouble calls.

SCADA-MANAGED

A system operator literally hundreds of miles away can get power at their beck and call, all through SCADA (System Control and Data Acquisition) and other systems.  The system operator can typically remotely ramp power up and down as necessary with the click of a mouse.  Power production is hardly unique to this.  Water and wastewater are complimentary services to electricity that utilize similar processes.  The basic modern necessities rest in automation.  While I could rant at length about robots taking my job, there are practical applications.  A simple indicator light or gauge can tell me the status of varying pieces of equipment so I don’t have to go physically check.  Motor-operated valves are a lot easier to operate from a touchscreen than physically cranking a 24” gate valve.  Much of the things being monitored are in hazardous or high-voltage areas.  I wouldn’t want to pay a human to hold a thermometer 24/7 inside what is essentially a giant radiator and call out the temperature every five seconds.  Let the computers do that.

“Let to computers do that.”  You’re reading this on a computer/phone/gadget.  Has it failed you in the past couple of weeks?  PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers; i.e., computers) control the cooling water, gates, and most of the systems that regulate the eventual product, electricity.  Once online, most generators can run essentially on autopilot with little human intervention and can do so for days and weeks.  And most powerhouses have multiple generators.  When one has an issue or needs to cool down, operators can ramp up or synchronize another in.  Additionally, most powerhouses cannot run all generators simultaneously because there is a finite amount of water. During peak months when the snowpack is all melting is a different story but for most of the year, once the water is drawn down, there is no more “fuel” until it comes down the river.  By balancing the projected power needs and weather forecasts, dams are operated in such a way as to plan for this.

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