A little bit of excitement today - high winds took down a number of trees, including one which landed on the high voltage utility lines in my neighborhood.

It was pretty wild, you could see the arcs and hear the crackle of the tree roasting, even over the wind. There were big bursts of smoke coming off the tree too, although those were carried away by the wind instantly. Luckily the firefighters were able to pull the tree off the lines and then cut off the top 10' or so, so no more fire risk (from that particular tree, anyway).

Since Xcel (our utility provider) doesn't care about anything but ensuring competitve C-suite pay and meeting shareholder expectations, they ignored several requests to shut down power. Made the firefighter's job a lot more dangerous, fortunately they're pros at this sort of thing.

The cop, of course, sat in his car the entire time (and probably collected hazard pay).

#fire #wind #nature #colorado #mountains #xcel #xcelenergy

More than 6,700 without power in southeast Boulder County, nearby area

Power has been restored to more than 6,700 customers who were without power in southeast Boulder County, along w…
#dining #cooking #diet #food #Cooking #boulder #bouldercounty #colorado #coloradonews #CookingTopics #crimeandpublicsafety #Erie #frontrange #lafayette #latestheadlines #localnews #news #WeldCounty #xcel
https://www.diningandcooking.com/2479585/more-than-6700-without-power-in-southeast-boulder-county-nearby-area/

There are so many stories that people had for PUC from the #xcel power outage in Colorado.

https://engagedora.org/share-your-feedback-with-puc/stories/

Phew, rough day.

Generator ran out of gas at 4am, so I woke up and plugged my ASV machine into my (as it turns out, partially charged) backup battery. That died at 5:30am, so I got up, got dressed, and left in search of more gasoline.

Both gas stations in town closed, no power. Gas station in the next town over closed, no power. Wound up driving over an hour to Denver to get gas, then an hour back up (I did get 15 gallons at least, that's 2 tanks for the generator/several days of runtime).

Power came back on literally ten minutes before I got back to the house.

Good thing I grabbed gas though, because Xcel is planning to cut our power AGAIN from 5am to 6pm tomorrow. Literally the entire day.

Also, got a flu shot yesterday and combined with all the running around and stress I have a *brutal* headache.

Ahh well, can't every day be a winner.

#rant #health #flu #power #xcelenergy #xcel #electricity

My favorite thing about Xcel is how I never have to worry about the gas in my backup generator going bad.

My second favorite thing is how they pay their CEO 8 million dollars a year instead of maintaining their infrastructure.

(Seriously, I could set up a bot to send this toot once a month and it would never seem out of place, because we have power outages at least once a month).

#utility #colorado #xcelenergy #xcel

Welp, wind finally took the power lines down (Xcel is lagging on maintaining/updating their infrastructure, so this isn't really unexpected).

I had already started making a protein shake, so I figured I'd try running the blender on my camping battery bank... and it works! Shows the draw too, which is a neat feature.

#xcel #electricity #power #battery #exercise #fitness

More characters can you help identify who they are dressed as.

#comiccon #London #xcel

London comic con
Help me identify the characters they are!

#comiccon #London #xcel

Xcel said that it would shrink its original Minnesota request for a 9.6%, $59.03 million rate increase to a 7.5%, $46.31 million hike on bills. A settlement with state officials and others would result in an extra $4.20 per month on the bills of residential customers if utility regulators approve. https://www.startribune.com/xcel-energy-gas-smaller-rate-hike-minnesota/600377647/

#Minnesota #Xcel #Energy