Re: Texas internet connectivity declining due to blackouts

[Carsten Bormann <cabo () tzi org>]

On 2021-02-17, at 19:36, Sean Donelan <sean () donelan com> wrote:
> undergrounding HV transmission lines

That’s not how it works.

In Germany, the majority of rural area HV transmission is above ground, for reasons that have been mentioned here.  If 
we have significant power outages (once-in-a-decade events), they are usually unforeseen damage to those (e.g., extreme 
icing rain in the 2005 event [1]). 

But the distribution network is underground, no poles in residential areas (same for phone/internet).

Yes, our pricing structure is different from the US, but that ist mostly unrelated.  We do like reliable power (and 
phone systems) over here, by the way.
(As Lenin said, communism is electrification plus soviet rule.  
We got rid of soviet rule :-)  Regulation that gets results is good.)

The nominal price of power you can’t get is pretty irrelevant, anyway :-)

Grüße, Carsten

[1]: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%BCnsterl%C3%A4nder_Schneechaos#Stromausfall