Suffice to say I find it very hard to accept that someone has already undertaken a proper investigation and reached that conclusion unless there's a known pre-existing vulnerability that hasn't been addressed.REN said: “Due to extreme temperature variations in the interior of Spain, there were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400 kV), a phenomenon known as ‘induced atmospheric vibration’. These oscillations caused synchronisation failures between the electrical systems, leading to successive disturbances across the interconnected European network.”
There will be a lot of hand wringing and work arounds going on over here ATM.Suffice to say I find it very hard to accept that someone has already undertaken a proper investigation and reached that conclusion unless there's a known pre-existing vulnerability that hasn't been addressed.
Unless there's obvious physical damage, eg the transmission line is physically destroyed, then investigations take quite a bit longer than that normally.
Seems hard to believe that a "natural" occurrence could cause such a disruption.Some charts on the situation in Portugal and Spain:
First starting with Portugal as that's the less complex of the two:
View attachment 198553
To explain this chart what you're looking at is a full 24 hour period which includes the rather obvious system collapse.
Orange = Import from Spain
Light yellow = solar
Grey = thermal (mostly gas in practice but also includes oil etc)
Light green = wind
Blue = hydro
Dark green = biomass
Now on the chart there's the thick black line, and also a thinner grey line. What's going on there is the thick black line indicates demand from consumers in Portugal. The thin grey line indicates demand + energy used for storage (mostly pumped hydro). Noting for clarity that Portugal has both conventional (dams on a river) and pumped hydro.
So immediately before the system collapse demand was about 6000MW plus about 2000MW used for hydro pumping. Majority of supply was import from Spain, solar and wind with some but not a lot of hydro, thermal (mostly gas) and biomass generation running.
Portugal's connections to elsewhere are in practice with Spain.
Noting this is a graph from a publicly available website and is not intended for engineering analysis, it ought be treated in that context. That the chart doesn't show it all going straight to zero immediately, there's a bend in the line around the 1500MW mark, but in practice I expect that's a limitation of the website data not what happened in reality. In practice it was most likely seconds at most from 6000MW to zero.
Now for Spain:
View attachment 198554
The not total but substantial system collapse is immediately visible. Explaining the chart in detail:
I first draw your attention to the zero line with 0 indicated at the left, and which is more readily apparent after the system collapse. Anything below this line is export to other countries or is hydro pumping load. Anything above this line is generation and consumption in Spain.
Below the line the colour code is (in order from top down)
Lighter blue = pumping
Darker blue = export to France
Red = export to Morocco
Green = export to Portugal
Not readily visible but there's also a very minor export to Andorra.
Now above the zero line, the colour code in order from top down is as follows and also here I'm showing output immediately before and after the incident.
From top to bottom as they appear on the chart.
Yellow line shows consumption. Generation excess to that is for export or pumping.
Source (colour on chart) = before | after
Biomass (purple) = 377 | 376
Solar thermal (red) = 1499 | 917
Solar PV (orange) = 18,068 | 6778
Wind (green) = 3646 | 2410
Hydro (blue) = 3171 | 1214
Cogen & Waste (light purple) = 1376 | 683
Gas turbine (dark red) = 81 | 105
Diesel engines (grey) = 261 | 266
Steam (oil/gas) (olive) = 115 | 114
Combined cycle gas (light yellow) = 1633 | 1061
Coal (brown) = 230 | 0
Nuclear (dark blue) = 3388 | 0
Pumped storage (light blue) = 29 | 30
Not in use immediately before or after the incident, but on the chart at other times:
Pale red = import from Morocco. There's a bit shown right at the top circa 3am.
Blue-purple = import from France. There's a significant amount at the top of the chart after the incident after 17:00
Noted that a few hours after the incident consumption appears to exceed generation. That would be a data error in practice, since physically it's not possible.
Nothing further to add at this stage.
Or system so unstable frequency wise that a small mishap and the inability for wind and worse solar to recover ,crashed the lot:Seems hard to believe that a "natural" occurrence could cause such a disruption.
Maybe hacking or someone pressed the wrong button....
Whatever the cause , it will be a big lesson for us as we head toward "net zero".Or system so unstable frequency wise that a small mishap and the inability for wind and worse solar to recover ,crashed the lot:
Look how quickly your rooftop solar disengage in case of frequency issue, multiply this with millions of them previously peaking all down to zero in a second
It is like missing a gear change on a cycle...and if you are riding up a hill...
Mr @Smurf1976 will give us the details in a coming days i have no doubt
That would be my guess, a frequency oscillation started and a domino effect took over, time will tell.Or system so unstable frequency wise that a small mishap and the inability for wind and worse solar to recover ,crashed the lot:
Look how quickly your rooftop solar disengage in case of frequency issue, multiply this with millions of them previously peaking all down to zero in a second
It is like missing a gear change on a cycle...and if you are riding up a hill...
Mr @Smurf1976 will give us the details in a coming days i have no doubt
Horrible story. Another example of greed , property developers and strata managers making out like bandits.Another case of buyer beware of what you are signed up for, I thought it worth putting here and in the real estate thread.
‘You feel like Darryl Kerrigan of The Castle’: How Adam got charged for his own solar power
Home owners who assumed their solar panels would help cut the cost of their electricity have just received a surprise bill, and they’re outraged.www.theage.com.au
Angry apartment owners say they’re being charged for electricity generated by solar panels on their own roof thanks to a confidential agreement signed between their developer and the energy provider.
When they moved into the new building in Sutherland, in Sydney’s south, they assumed the solar would help with their common property electricity bills.
Instead, they’ve just been presented with a surprise bill for $28,717.06 for the past 12 months, seen by this masthead, with no indication of any reduction for the solar power, even though a sustainability report for the building attached to the contract of sale attributed hot water systems and outdoor pool heating to solar collectors.
The system is part of an embedded network arrangement (ENA), whereby infrastructure providers install systems such as electricity, water, sewerage and internet for free, or for a reduced payment, to developers’ projects, on condition they sign up their apartment buyers to service contracts, which can sometimes be well above market rates.
It is becoming increasingly common as it can mean huge savings for property developers, who would in the past have borne those costs themselves. But owners have no control over the terms of a contract that was signed at the start of the development.
An Ausgrid spokesperson said: “Ausgrid does not purchase or sell electricity. It is up to the embedded network who they purchase electricity from and how billing arrangements work for the customers within their network.” Instead, the distribution network offers a range of pricing options to electricity retailers who then decide if, what and how they will pass them on.
New NSW strata laws to come in later this year will mean that there are new disclosure requirements about embedded networks at the point of sale, three-year term limits will apply to embedded electricity supply contracts, and owners corporations will be protected against unfair contract terms.
In the case of Dwell, a 10-year contract for electricity, hot water and gas with Arc Energy was signed by the building’s then strata manager, Michael Lee of Result Strata. He affixed the Owners Corporation seal to the contract on December 1, 2023, the month before the building’s first meeting of owners, its AGM, on January 29, 2024.
Owners claim they knew nothing about the contract as it wasn’t mentioned at that meeting, according to the minutes.
A spokesperson for NSW Fair Trading said: “Fair Trading does not have powers to vary contractual arrangements entered into between parties, nor direct schemes to run their building in certain ways.”
A spokesperson for the Attorney-General’s Department said such a situation was outside their remit.
Net zero..Whatever the cause , it will be a big lesson for us as we head toward "net zero".
Well @qldfrog, it sounds like that's what may well have happened.That would be my guess, a frequency oscillation started and a domino effect took over, time will tell.
Good odds we were right indeed.Well @qldfrog, it sounds like that's what may well have happened.
Yep, spot on, the powers that be know the issues.Good odds we were right indeed.
The so inconvenient truth....
Sadly we will not become as rich as our predecessor Al Gore
So next step solar farms powering giant motors rotating 200t wheels running an alternator.
Everything is just an engineering issue with enough dollar like a ladder to put satellite in orbit, solar is not bad but not suited to the grid need in the current setup.and reflect on how lucky Spain was to have access to both France and Morocco grid to restart.If it was an excess of solar energy that caused the grid collapse then in one way its good that solar is capable of producing all the energy required and more, the issue seems to be having the capacity to either store or dispose of the excess.
Surely that is just an engineering issue and not a reason to to demean solar power in general?
If it was an excess of solar energy that caused the grid collapse then in one way its good that solar is capable of producing all the energy required and more, the issue seems to be having the capacity to either store or dispose of the excess.
Surely that is just an engineering issue and not a reason to to demean solar power in general?
Weeelll, yes and no, it is great that there is enough generation, it isn't great that the generation has exceeded the ability to control it, when everyone in Spain and Potugual were dependant on it.If it was an excess of solar energy that caused the grid collapse then in one way its good that solar is capable of producing all the energy required and more, the issue seems to be having the capacity to either store or dispose of the excess.
Surely that is just an engineering issue and not a reason to to demean solar power in general?
If the East Coast went down totally, how would we restart and how long is it likely to take before it would be back working correctly.......................Weeelll, yes and no, it is great that there is enough generation, it isn't great that the generation has exceeded the ability to control it, when everyone in Spain and Potugual were dependant on it.
Look at it this way, if the whole East coast Grid collapsed, because an over frequency event caused a domino collapse event, then unlike Spain and Portugal we don't have the reserve capacity of France, to restore it quickly.
Would you and the cheer squad be running around doing high fives, saying magic, we told you we could get 100% renewables, if it took days to re establish the grid?
Like I keep saying, it isn't a good situation, when you get the ideology in front of the technology, it will be interesting to watch the fallout.
I think we will be posting it up soon, re adjustments to targets and deployment rates may be slowed, as inertia and system security is upgraded and installed.
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