Texas82GP's GMT900
- Thread starter Texas82GP
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I know. It pretty much doesn't snow here, which I like just fine. The downside, we can't generate power in Texas when it gets cold. Also, people panic buy all the gasoline when they have nowhere to go.
Nowhere near that graceful, I assure you. The black and white is not that far off the mark though. My black leather coat and my white lower back and butt-crack.I bet you looked majestic...
Jared, apologies for making light of the situation. Didn't figure this storm would play out the way it did. I was talking to an associate office I deal with in IAH yesterday morning. He said some people in their other Tx and OK offices were still having it pretty bad. Stuff like having to sleep in their cars due to electric heat in the house and no hydro for this extended time. Geez flooding a couple years back and now this. You all are a tough bunch
No offense taken here, friend. We're blessed. We have the generator and transfer switch from past efforts to be prepared for the aftermath of hurricanes. We never dreamed we'd use it for a winter storm. My guess is the generator, which we bought maybe 10 years ago, hasn't been out of the shed in 8 years. We didn't even need it for Harvey.
Between them and the gas fireplace, we've been able to keep the house warm. Previously, I didn't think much of that gas fireplace. I always thought I would prefer a real, wood burning fireplace. I don't feel that way any longer. The gas fireplace has been an enormous asset and convenience through this. There's no way we would have had enough wood to get through something like this.
The power was out 21 hours the first day, its been on and off at shorter and shorter intervals since. That's allowed our gas furnaces to run which really helps. The fireplace and space heaters don't come close to the BTU's the furnaces put out. We don't have the furnaces on the transfer switch since we put it in with hurricanes in mind.
My sister-in-law does our grocery shopping on two-week intervals so we haven't been in a bind grocery wise. Many don't keep much food on hand and aren't as prepared.
Our water has stayed operational throughout this. We're under a boil order and have filled a few bathtubs as a precaution but so far we've also been blessed in this regard.
Many are far less fortunate and or prepared. No gas heat, no generator, water turned off, not enough food in the cupboards. We've offered shelter to several of our neighbors and my colleagues from work. No takers. We have had my dad and stepmother here for a few nights as the power was out at their house and they don't have a generator.
We had a burst pipe in the ceiling over the third car garage where my brother parks his 78 Camaro that we did an 11 year restoration on. We were fortunate here as well. The car is fine, the ceiling didn't fall, the damage is in the garage and we were able to cut the line back, cap it and restore the water service to the house.
I can't say the past few days have been fun but they could have been far worse and have been for many.
The scandal is the inability to generate electricity in Texes when temperatures dip below freezing. Vast wind farms and solar farms have been built in the state over the past few decades. When the wind turbines froze up, a reported 12,000 Megawatts of generation was lost. In the past few days, the electric distributor in our area has had scarcely enough power to serve half the market at any given time. Hence the "rolling" blackouts. They were woefully unprepared to roll the blackouts so people went 30+ hours without electricity (heat) when temperatures were in the teens and twenties. Sure, this was an "extreme" event for this area but I think we're over reliant on renewable energy sources at this point and need a more robust generation capability based on natural gas.
It looks like we have two more days of this to ride here, based on temperature forecast. Then hopefully things will start to get back to normal.
Be happy it didn't get cold enough to freeze your sewer line. That really ruins your day 😉.
All joking aside, I suspect Texas will persevere and come out stronger. Glad you and yours are surviving man.
All joking aside, I suspect Texas will persevere and come out stronger. Glad you and yours are surviving man.
One would think there is going to be a serious uproar about the complacency or ignorance about preparedness as it relates to the weather and the fallacy of "green" energy.
I honestly thought this situation was going to last a day or two, have a few laughs, and we'd move past it. Seems 2020 was just a warm-up. No pun intended.
There already is a serious uproar. Folks are livid. Will anything come of it? Is anyone held accountable now days? I'm pretty jaded.
I'd like to hope that the lost money from not being able to generate and sell power would drive change but who knows the extent of intended/unintended consequences from regulation (or perhaps lack thereof) that lead to this. Is it just stupidity? Could it really be as simple as nobody thought we'd ever have a winter storm in Texas? Keep in mind, this was not a huge ice storm. Our situation isn't from power lines being down.
People need to be better prepared to handle events like this. Friends, colleagues and family members have been living in miserable conditions for the past few days because they were completely unprepared for this disruption. They need to do better or they will suffer the consequences again.
Admittedly, when this storm was rolling in, I really didn't expect to loose power. The trees in my area, near electric power easements, were all recently aggressively trimmed by the local power distributor. They've only done this twice now since Hurricane Ike in 2008. I figured the roads would be icy for a few days, we'd all hunker down at home and that would be that. I never dreamed of an electric generation shortfall. I had no idea that wind had become such a significant portion of the power generation and that those wind turbines freeze up like that.
Still, we had a generator and 10 gallons of gas in the shed and food in the cabinets. We weren't helpless like so many are today.
Our strategy is to be increasingly prepared and self reliant. When we move 40 miles north of here, we plan to have a whole house standby generator and a vast tank of propane. We'll have a gas stove, gas water heater, gas furnace and gas fireplace. We'll have an onsite septic system. While we'll have City water instead of well (not allowed), my sister-in-law wants a pool so we'll have plenty of water on hand for flushing. We'll see to it that we have plenty to eat and drink.
I hope I never live to see a frozen sewer line.
How long does propane keep? I never even thought of a propane generator. Gas in cans won't last forever. I've long planned to take that approach to my forever home. Heated floors, a wood boiler outside, redundant means of heating, etc, solid backup power, etc. Germany got similarly hammered when their solar panels all froze over too recently and they had to import power from other countries who still burn coal. Go go national security!
