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IEEE Spectrum: Background to the Blackout
From: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2003 18:28:03 -0400
X-Sender: scherry () shogun ieee org Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2003 18:23:12 -0400 To: "David J. Farber" <farber () cis upenn edu> From: Steven Cherry <s.cherry () ieee org> Subject: IEEE Spectrum: Background to the BlackoutX-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by linc.cis.upenn.edu id h7KMNcpQ005297Dave,Last week's blackout in the northeast U.S. is obviously a major story for IEEE Spectrum.We've collected some of our power-grid-related and other energy articles from the past few years and made them publicly available. The general URL for the collection is<http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/special/aug03/blackout.html>We'll also be posting new articles on the blackout as they're ready. Here are the links to the individual articles that are there now. They're in chronological order, but if you have time for only one, I recommend skipping down to "Restructuring the Thin-Stretched Grid."Steven * 2002 Department of Energy grid studyAn expert team organized by the U.S. Department of Energy prepared to release its National Transmission Grid Study at a time when other authorities were sounding alarms about the state of the transmission system.See "Energy Team Readies Major Transmission Study," by Barbara Klein and William Sweet:http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/feb02/ntran.html * 2001 Cheney task force on energy policyThe controversial study headed by U.S. Vice President Richard B. Cheney squarely recognized a crisis in the electricity sector but took a rather one-dimensional view of the problem. Better ways of operating transmission systems, recommended by the policy arm of IEEE, got short shrift in the report. The study paid lip service, but not very forcefully, to strengthening the nation's self-managing reliability organization by giving it greater enforcement powers.See "Energy Woes," by William Sweet and Elizabeth A. Bretz: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jul01/ewoe.html * Three views on deregulation of the U.S. electric industryThe U.K. model on which U.S. electric industry deregulation was based is, after 10 years, a failure. In addition to the essay explaining Britain's deregulation woes, two other views on the problems inherent in the deregulation of electric energy are presented.See "Technology Offers Solutions to the Current Power Crisis" by Karl Stahlkopf, "Electricity Restructuring in Britain: Not a Model to Follow" by Theo MacGregor, and "Putting Consumers First" by Glenn English:http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/jun01/spea.html * Seeing at a glance what's up with the gridWhile the electric power system was designed as the ultimate in plug-and-play convenience, the humble wall outlet has become a gateway to one of the largest and most complex of man-made objects. Basically the grid in most of North America is just one big electric circuit encompassing billions of components, tens of millions of kilometers of transmission line, and thousands of generators. More than ever, it's essential for power traders, grid managers, public service boards, and the public itself to be able to see and imagine what's going on.See "Visualizing the Electric Grid," by Thomas J. Overbye and James D. Weber: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/feb01/egrid.html * 2000 post-outage study team (POST)Following widespread power outages in the summer of 1999, from New York City and New England to Chicago and Texas, the U.S. Department of Energy convened an expert panel to diagnose the situation. A picture emerged in that panel's hearings of a power system that was already being stretched to its limits. Whether the talk was of generation and transmission capacity, distribution lines or control equipment, service personnel or simulation engineers, it was the same story: too few resources to easily satisfy demands made on systems designed for radically different requirements.See "Restructuring the Thin-Stretched Grid," by William Sweet: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun00/grdo.html * An outstanding grid regulating organizationEven at a time when the electric power system was stretched to its limits, and there had yet to be any serious test of the newly created "independent system operators" established to manage deregulated grid systems, one such organization stood out as exceptionally competent and effective. This was the Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Maryland ISO, or, formally, the PJM Interconnection-an organization that proved its mettle once again on 14 August, when it largely preventing the cascading outage that began in Ohio from infecting its control area.See "PJM Interconnection: Model of a Smooth Operator," by Elizabeth A. Bretz: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun00/grdp.html * Could hackers be the next big threat?When the northeastern grid went down on 14 August, suspicions immediately centered on the possibility of terrorism. That fear was almost certainly unfounded, but this does not mean that such threats are non-existent. The nation's electric power systems are more dependent all the time on communications, and those communications offer ill-willed hackers tempting targets.See "The Next Threat to Grid Reliability-Data Security," by David A. Jones and Ronald L. Skelton:http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/spea.html * Lessons from the 1996 California outagesThe inglorious summer of 1996 blackouts taught the West to improve emergency control and protection and to sharpen simulation techniques. Though California would experience another huge electricity crisis in 2001-2002, that one was largely induced by a faulty system of deregulation that bankrupted the state's utilities. The state's independent system operator, working frantically, largely kept the lights on.See "Improving Grid Behavior," by Carson W. Taylor: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/grid.html * Challenges to grid reliability from deregulationEven as the lessons of California were being absorbed, it was evident that the process of separating electricity generation from transmission was sowing uncertainty as to who was responsible for making new investments-or even identifying new investment needs. And experts predicted that maintain reliable grids in a deregulated power industry would get harder, as temptations to cut corners multiplied.See "Keeping the Lights On," by John D. Mountford and Ricardo R. Austria: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/pow.html * The promise of new technologyThe promise of new technologies offering much closer management of electricity flows is still largely unrealized. One such technology, known as flexible ac transmission systems or FACTS, relies on large-scale semiconductor devices. Another technology, pioneered in the western grid system, allows power system dynamics to be monitored in real time. It depends on digital communications and GPS-based time-keeping. Yet even in 1997, the buildout and effective use of such system was hampered by inadequate financing and manpower, Spectrum learned from experts like former U.S. energy secretary Hazel O'Leary.See "Tighter Controls for Busier Systems," by Karl E. Stahlkopf and Mark R. Wilhelm:http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/apr97/inte.html * Lessons from abroad?In the wake of the 14 August disturbance, former U.S. energy secretary Bill Richardson compared the U.S. electricity system to those of Third World countries. That may have been insulting to less advanced economies. In 1997, two emigré engineers from Russia argued that the United States had much to learn from practices developed in the former Soviet Union. However that may be, it's evident that there are poor countries with much more reliable grids, and few if any rich countries with grids that experience as frequent and serious problems.See "Heading Off Emergencies in Large Electric Grids," by Nickolai Grudinin and Ilya Roytelman:http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/apr97/reli.html -- -- Steven Cherry, +1 212-419-7566 Senior Associate Editor IEEE Spectrum, for Fair and Balanced technology news 3 Park Ave, New York, NY 10016 <s.cherry () ieee org> <http://www.spectrum.ieee.org>
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- IEEE Spectrum: Background to the Blackout Dave Farber (Aug 20)