zhkentWindmills Off Today
Saw that Man runs car into electric substation (AP) and wildfires ksn.com news happened the 19th.
I haven’t yet found any news linking either of these to the shutdown.
Las Vegas police investigate car ramming into power substation
Las Vegas police say they’re investigating a car that rammed into a power substation as a “terrorism-related event.” Authorities say there’s no ongoing threat to the public. Police identified the driver of the vehicle as a 23-year-old man from Albany, New York, who was reported missing and is now dead. Police say Dawson Maloney had communicated with family before the crash, referencing self-harm, and said he was going to commit an act that would place him on the news. Authorities say he referred to himself as a terrorist in a message sent to his mother.
Don’t forget the poor earthworms!!!
/S
Was it really windy? Turbines need steady medium wind speeds to operate; when the wind speed increases above a threshold they stop generating, and sometimes angle the blades to reduce the drag (so the mast and foundation aren’t overstressed).
I can’t say for certain but some experience in the electric grid space gives me some of the following reasons:
The circuit they are connected to was faulted
They were transferred to a supply that they are not approved to generate on
If they are a large facility then they might have had a failed communication channel that is used to disconnect them if there’s an issue.
This isn’t an exhaustive list but just some common ones
The grid needs to be balanced, i.e. the supply and demand must match. You can’t pump more power than needed just because you can, otherwise everything stops working.
Given this, it’s possible the reason is that there wasn’t enough demand at that time, especially if other wind farms were generating enough power given the strong winds.
Not an expert by any means, just an educated guess.