I am not a computer technical person (obviously). My question is, if power grids do go down because of the Y2K problem, how long would it take to get them back up? I assume to get them back up, the original problem (with the software or the chips) would have to be corrected; how long would that take and would it even be possible? Everyone I've asked who works for utilities tells me that they are "prepared for disaster" but it seems like they're prepared for disasters like hurricanes & ice storms knocking down the power lines. My question is connected to my own "contingency planning", i.e., if popwer will be gone for a month, then I stock up on a months worth of food & water and ammo to repel looters; if it'll be down for ever, I move near a fast running stream and build my pown power supply (or learn to live without.)

-- Anonymous, February 08, 1998

Answers

Mary Lou:

It seems to me that if the embedded chip problem is so difficult to root out, the problem will be many times more difficult to solve if those doing the remediation testing, themselves, don't have electricity. At the very least, a power plant needs operators. Are we so sure operating personnel will be able to get to work? Will traffic lights be working? Will your car start? Will we, in fact, be permitted, to leave our homes if police, fire, and ambulances cannot respond to emergencies? My advice: hope for the best; prepare for the worst.

-- Anonymous, February 09, 1998

Marylou,

This won't directly answer your question on how long power would be down, but there's an older thread on this forum called "What about manual back-up systems?" under the "Business Issues" heading. Take a look at the responses. That will give you an idea of what it takes to manually run these places.

My guess is, if they go down, they'll be down for quite awhile.

-- Anonymous, February 09, 1998

Hello MaryLou {{{ goodby heart }}}:

Tried peering into my mystical globe, no response. But, if the electric grid goes down and stays down for more than 60 days, kiss modern civilization goodby. Hope Rick or Raleigh visit this area and are able to provide input. I, for one, really enjoy their response, humor, clarity, and conviction. Good luck on your survival plans.

-- Anonymous, February 12, 1998

Sandra McDonald asks if Roleigh reads the postings. I certainly do! I'm swamped these days and I have to limit my postings to the few that I do make. I try to concentrate on my web site, my articles, and local communication attempts with the officials in Minnesota. Up here, it is basically the Siberia of North America. We've got a lot of work to do to ensure minimal problems in 2000. Yesterday, I got to interview Senator Wellstone's State Director, Connie Lewis, for about 1.25 hours on the problem and she's interested enough to introduce me to some important people in the local state government. Hopefully, in the next month or so, something will happen in Minnesota. Still, no one should rest their hopes on government to do what's fully right. I'll be shocked if I really accomplish a lot in this state. One has to do individual fallback planning too. My best advice for individual fallback planning is to choose the top books I recommend at my web site, plus follow the survival links I have at my links page. Good luck everyone, we all need it as well as God's blessings, plus lots of hard human effort. Back to work now. TTYL (talk to you later) -- Roleigh Martin

-- Anonymous, February 14, 1998

The real answer -- not pessimistic, in my mind -- is never. [Let's see if this thing will accept HTML ... ]

The reason for this is simple:

Let's assume for a moment that the local power company has solved its internal business systems' Y2K problems -- at least to the point where they can write checks.

Unfortunately, the power company (them) can't deliver power, so none of the business system computer can work.

How are they going to cut checks to pay the employees to do all the work necessary to get power up? They might get some people to work for free -- for a while. But if the massive interconnecting business systems that control cutting checks can't be brought on-line, no one will get any checks for a long time.

Cash? Not in a million years. To begin with, the power company may not have the resources to dispense paper money. They probably can't figure out how much to pay employees, in any case -- because that information is stored on computers! They might conceivably say, "Bring in your last pay stub and that's what you'll get this week."

But then, three days after the lights didn't come back on, there were massive runs on the banks and there's no cash left for the power company to use to pay employees.

(Actually, I expect the bank runs to occur this year, perhaps early next, considering that FDIC recently issued closure warnings effective August, 1998 if 213 of the country's largest banks couldn't demonstrate Y2K-compliancy.)

If you think a power company has enough petty cash to pay all its employees, you have another think coming.

So ... faced with no power and the resultant food shortages and chaos, how many power company employees are going to work for nothing before they decide that's not good enough to feed their kids?

It's a real catch-22. Either we fix it in advance, or we don't fix it at all.

Bill Stone

-- Anonymous, February 25, 1998

There are some issues that need to be considered. Each problem that could occur would be handled in a different fashion - problems could occur that cause the grid to go down. My understanding is that the two most likely are:

a) Difficulties affecting major Transmission lines. If protection gear or other devices fail causing major Transmission lines to fail, load rapidly drops off and major difficulties could be experienced. In a worse case scenario, large parts of the grid may be shutdown.

b) Failure of the central control system. This could cause a total system shutdown.

Problems that affect the major Transmission lines (likely to be few in number), could probably be isolated quite quickly and hence could be dealt with in a reasonable timeframe - if replacement parts are available and work and providing there is no peripheral damage caused by the problem.

If the control systems go down, bringing the system back up could me much more diffcult. No doubt backup systems would be invoked - which may suffer exactly the same problem (the backup system is often a mirror image of the first system). The problem has to be isolated and corrected - in an environment of no power and potentially little or no source code (the system may have been supplied as object code or could be an operating system problem) this may not be easy. Problems may also be the result of information coming into the system. It may be difficult to track and fix these points of failure.

The problems may now be componded at the power station. Coal fired power stations need to draw current regardless of whether they supply any as they have to keep their turbines revolving. They normally draw current from other stations that are operational. With the transmission lines down or the central control system non-operational, the turbines would stop. If the power station cannot come up with a contingency plan to rotate the generators regularly, the weight of the internal drum can bend the spindle - a problem likely to take months to fix. Other problems such as widespread failure of reclosers throughout a distribution network or widespread failure of intelligent relays, could have very severe isolated impact. The sheer size of the problem (failure at hundreds of different geographically dispersed points simultaneously) would likely be the major impediment to getting the grid fully operational again.

Much of the discussion to date on electricity utilities has focussed on the generation side of the equation. Generation capacity is linked by transmission networks. There is built in redundancy - the power station down the road. As Auckland has recently demonstrated - the most likely cause of widespread longterm disruption will be the Transmission network and/or the manner in which it interfaces to the Gsneration system.

Finally - to answer - will people work if they are not being paid? Yes they will! Without electricity, the world stops. The only people who can get it operational again will be the people employed by the utilities - they have a vested interest - backpay - and like everyone else they want to eat, drink and live.

I cannot envisage any situation developing where power NEVER comes back on. Hope this helps a little.

PS.These are my views and not those of my company - all usual disclaimers.

-- Anonymous, March 09, 1998

I think Bill Stone's answer is a little off the mark.

I'm an electric utility worker and it seems to me that if there were a state of emergency, the prevailing attitude would not be one of getting a paycheck, but of survival. To that end, I personally would work like hell without a paycheck to get the power back on. There are limits of course - if Y2K problems drag on for months and there's no money for food (but would there be food to buy?), then Mazlow's hierarchy of needs kick in to focus attention on more immediate needs.

We recently had an ice storm here in Maine that did put us in a state of emergency. The power to the main building was out for a few days and essential services (including the mainframe) were kept going by a huge diesel generator that lives in its own building. People came in and worked all hours to keep the vital systems up and running until the emergency passed. I know of no-one who was concerned about getting paid. The only concern was in getting power restored to people in the middle of winter. Thanks to El Nino, temperatures were milder than normal, so no-one froze. Who knows what it will be like in January of 2000.

Again, I think most utility workers realize how vital their jobs are. Until food and the will to keep going run out, I think most will work just to restore power.

Ted Markow

-- Anonymous, March 26, 1998