Now that the latest NERC report has been out a few days, and the dust begins to settle, I offer my personal take on the report.

To establish my "credentials":

I read the report and accompanying memos.

I attended the NERC conferences.

I watched the press conference August 3.

I work for a real utility (although my opinions here are my own).

I've Y2k tested many power devices.

The two key elements of the report/press conference:

1: The power industry is ready TODAY. If Y2k happens tonight, consumers probably wouldn't even notice, as it relates to power. One pundit commented a few months back that companies have "broken the back" of Y2k. Well, its back is broken, it is brain dead, and all internal functions are failing, and he's being kept on life support pending notification of relatives. The "end game", as Ed Yourdon refers to it, is essentially over for power companies.

All the discussions about utilities being only this or that percent complete for the past year are now MOOT. The 17 entities that report not being ready, and making sure the exceptions list gets whittled down--these should be the focus now. And marianne, you'll be overjoyed to know that in the past month, 10 of those 35 nuke plants finished up, leaving only 25 plants with remaining Y2k issues. And Gordon, I see that Connectiv reports ready with exceptions...

2: As in the last report, Y2k testing has verified that Y2k will have a minimal impact on electric systems operations. The industry has performed thousands of tests on hundreds of devices and systems. From page iv of the report: "In most cases, Y2k did not affect primary device functions related to keeping generators and power delivery facilities in service..."

What should the consumer do? First, read the NERC report. Go to appendix B and look for your power company. If it's listed as ready with exceptions, call the company up and ask for details on what devices are not ready, and when they'll be made ready. Go to your power company's web site.

What about all these threads about NERC lying based on old meeting notes or other web sites?. To those who are looking up the meeting notes, I have a question: Were you in attendance at the meeting? My experience working in business has shown me that notes and power point presentation copies cannot accurately convey the tone of the meeting or what was said. If you weren't there, I suggest that you contact more than one person who was present and get their perspective before assuming the worst and posting about it.

This whole business about conspiracies and cover-up are in my opinion the result of minds fertile with the idea that the industry has something to hide. Whether the industry has sufficiently prepared is open for discussion, but this business about conspiracies is just a bit much. There have been too many accusations to cover in detail, but I debunk one theory as an example:

A poster was "shocked" that a large percentage of utilities haven't made their spreadsheet monthly submittals to NERC available to the public. At face value, it might appear that a cover-up is underfoot. Wanna know why many companies aren't sharing it? NOBODY ASKED. Not the state commission, not a single customer. How's that for a big conspiracy?

Is there anything left to discuss about Y2k and utilities? Sure. The September drill, finalizing contingency plans, whether testing was sufficient, reliance on communications, sabotage, remaining companies not complete, etc....the list goes on and on.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Answers

as a great man once said:

My experience tells me that, instead of bothering about how the whole world may live in the right manner, we should think how we ourselves may do so. We do not even know whether the world lives in the right manner or in a wrong manner. If, however, we live in the right manner, we shall feel that others also do the same, or shall discover a way of persuading them to do so."

"Non co-operation with evil is as much a duty as co-operation with good."

Real Swaraj will come, not by the acquisition of authority by a few, but by the acquisition of the capacity by all to resist authority when it is abused.

-- Mahatma Gandhi

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Hmmm...your response is a bit eccentric, marianne, but I'll try to respond as to what I think you are getting at.

I wouldn't cooperate with evil either. If I found a single device that I knew could compromise the safety of a power customer, and I didn't think it was being thoroughly dealt with, I would use this very forum to anonymously expose those who are compromising. And so could any other "whistle-blower" from inside the industry. But this is not happening, because Y2k doesn't effect a "24/7/365" industry like power.

Secondly, I appeal to you on a more non-technical level. I have a special-needs child who is dependent on me any my family for his everyday needs. And I am not allowed to be with anyone in my family during the rollover, because I have to work the night of 12/31. If I thought that Y2k would bring down the grid, I would be first in line to criticize the industry and demand that they do more, because of my concern for my family.

I wish you could personally meet the industry persons being questioned and vilified in these forums. I think your view would change for the better as a result.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

dan,

check out the other thread currently running on this forum. it is titled "response to doe fraud - hiding plutonium exposure from workers."

i am sure you will be amused by the fact that i have just been accused of being an apologist.

what i have written in that post is how i really feel. i do not for one moment believe that *you* have evil intent. but i also believe that there is more to the problem than meets your eye.

i do hope you are making personal preparations for your family's sake, remember, if i am wrong you can always use the supplies and they will have been purchased with 1998 dollars. if you are wrong...

and remember to factor this into the picture... all plants are *not* created equally, you are not an expert regarding telecommunications, nor the fuel supply chain, vendors are not prepared, nasa predicts terrible solar flares, the government is on the record regarding the heightened possibility of both terrorist attacks on facilities and in cyberspace.

so when you feel secure that everything will be well in your world... ask yourself how you arrived at that conclusion.

and remember... we are not just talking about 1/1/2000.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Dan,

Hmmm, so Conectiv is ready, with exceptions? I think the exceptions are their nuke plants, for one thing. The NRC has flagged them just this last week. You will note that Hope Creek, Salem 1 & 2, are on the late finish, watch list. Will they finish? Who knows. Obviously they are only going to be done with about 15% of their systems, by their own admission. And when you add Peach Bottom to the NRC list, you have the making of a very unstable local grid next January. I would love to be optimistic about all this like you are. Reason gets in the way however. Those darn facts keep raining on this local parade, and it's not the kind of rain we need right now here on the East Coast. Say Dan, I suppose you take airline flights from time to time. Did you ever see the movie Flight Of The Phoenix? That's where an airplane crash landed out in the desert, I think it was, and they cobbled together something from some *mission critical* parts to try to get out of there. Would you look forward to flying on such a thing? The "engineer" in charge of the thing felt very sure it would work OK. You know, I'm just looking at your very first item above, where you state that not only is everything ready right now but if we went through the rollover tonight, nobody would even notice. Are you familiar with the Jewish term Chutzpah?

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Dan the Power Man wrote:

>This whole business about conspiracies and cover-up are in my opinion the result of minds fertile with the idea that the industry has something to hide. Whether the industry has sufficiently prepared is open for discussion, but this business about conspiracies is just a bit much.

Who needs a conspiracy theory? I just don't think engineers and managers are any more competent at dealing with Y2k than they are at anything else. Any plant that took the problem seriously, started early enough and applied enough resources to the problem will get through it okay. How many did that?

In some plants, the management is not competent. In other plants, the engineers are not competent. In a few plants neither the managers and engineers are competent. The best evidence for this is that many, many power plants got a very late start.

If they were all competent all of the questions about grid stability would have been put to rest a year ago. That was a responsibility of the power companies. No matter what happens, the industry as a whole failed to meet that responsibility. That - not my fertile mind imagining the industry has something to hide - is why there are doubts.

You do not need a conspiracy theory to have predicted that every power company would declare themselves "ready" before 12/31/1999. Market forces demand it and individuals are loathe to admit they screwed up. If there are doubts about a few systems it is very easy to decide they will very probably work and express confidence. It says so right in the NERC report.

This does not mean the report is a lie. Does the NERC report reflect reality? Maybe. It would read the same way even if it did not. Two years ago I would have read a report like the NERC report and accepted it almost entirely because I believed in the professionalism of engineers. The benefit of the doubt always ran your way. I don't have that confidence in you any more. It is funny how something as subtle as a lack of confidence changes the perception of a document like the NERC report. But it does. I don't necessarily think it is a lie, but I don't blindly believe any more either.

Why did I lose confidence? Because the industry decided it was okay to dance on the rim of the canyon. Baboom. Confidence and trust goes out the window. You can't get that back with a million posts that say that everything is okay because engineers are great dancers.

Unless you can give me a good reason why the industry was not 100% compliant a year ago, I will be skeptical about everything. The trust was betrayed a year ago. This most recent NERC report should have been published a year ago. That is why the industry - and engineers - are being "vilified".

You lost me and you lost a lot of other people too. I think you will lose even more people on rollover even if the problems are localized and relatively short lived. It will be years before credibility will be regained.

"Trust us," says NERC.

"Sorry," I say, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I need more than trust when I am dealing with people who think it is responsible to dance on the rim of a canyon."

You say everything will be okay? Fine. I don't disbelieve what you say, but I'm from Missouri these days. I have to consider the source of that message and the track record. I'm waiting until rollover before I blindly believe anything the industry - or an industry engineer - says about the problem.

You can blame me for this if you would like, but I don't think you should be surprised if a lot of people feel the same way I do. The industry brought it on themselves.

Tom

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

"Conspiracy theory"? Nice straw man, Dan.

Who needs a conspiracy theory? I just don't think engineers and managers are any more competent at dealing with Y2k than they are at anything else. Any plant that took the problem seriously, started early enough and applied enough resources to the problem will get through it okay. How many did that?

Bingo, Tom.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Two years ago I would have read a report like the NERC report and accepted it almost entirely because I believed in the professionalism of engineers. The benefit of the doubt always ran your way. I don't have that confidence in you any more.

I agree. As I've said before on this forum, I had a great deal more confidence in the utilities before I started reading what pseudonymous "engineers" post on this forum.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

The press release used no numbering, and the wording is not the same. I do not believe that you were trying to mislead (I know you better) and were probably speaking in general, but you do appear to have been "coloring" the story (both of us could wear out a box of crayons on a good y2k article..;). Having said that, as written, it is still misleading.

Misleading? Baloney. If my article had consisted entirely of "Recap", you might have a case. Since it is preceded by four sections with quotations, I don't see how you do.

Either that, or I'm not very good at "coloring". :-) For that to be effective, it has to come at the beginning, before the quotations, not at the end. You know: like all the good-news articles that flood the newspapers.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 1999

Factfinder wrote:

>In summary, I have seen no good evidence of an outright attempt by NERC to deceive the DOE or the public. Spin, yes, outright lies and deception, nope.

You have it backwards, Factfinder. There is no good evidence that NERC is being transparent. Lane is offering a good reason to be skeptical. Here is another: In the initial DOE letter to NERC, the terms of reference for NERC were to assure the American people that they could count on the grid. Are we being assured? Here is one more: The executive summary in the original NERC report did not summarize the data in the original NERC report. Is that transparency?

Here is a final reason to be skeptical: Suppose, just suppose that deep in the bowels of NERC, the conclusions went something like: "It's 50-50 we lose the entire grid. Some companies will get up and running again, but half the country will be without power for months." (I said "suppose" extreme bad news, remember.)

How would NERC write up extreme bad news? This does not just apply to power. It applies to every government and every business on the face of the earth. The Y2k problem is one that screams for a skeptical public response. Robert Alloway, head of the National Leadership Task Force on Y2K, an independent, non-profit organization was quoted as saying about the US Government: "[Government agencies] are under tremendous pressure from Congress to hit their numbers, to be 100% compliant. And in a practical sense, they will do so even if they have to drop some of their mission-critical systems."

Anybody who has worked in a very large organization knows this is true. NERC is applying the same pressure. CEO's are shouting at CIO's who are shouting at engineers. Companies have to be "ready" so they will be ready. At the end of the day a mission critical system will be one you have time to fix.

Tom

-- Anonymous, August 09, 1999

In summary, I have seen no good evidence of an outright attempt by NERC to deceive the DOE or the public. Spin, yes, outright lies and deception, nope.

Well, I won't necessarily disagree with that. Except to note that sometimes the result is the same, so what's the difference in the end?

On the bright side Lane, I just read several of your "nines" articles disputing 9/9/1999 as a significant "problem date", and believe you have this one pegged right. You wisely made an exception for special coding using the year 99 - I know of a number of cases where the year 99 was a minor problem for embedded system devices.

Fortunately, this "nines" thing will be old news a month from now. :-) Meanwhile, though, I'm sure we're going to get treated to lots of botched explanations from clueless news reporters. :-(

-- Anonymous, August 09, 1999

Marianne wrote: Real Swaraj will come Let him come, whoever this Mr. Swaraj is  I am not afraid. (Im not saying Im tough, Im just saying the tough guys dont mess with me.)

Tom Benjamin wrote: Lane is offering a good reason to be skeptical. A point well made Tom. From the information that Lane presented in his article concerning the minutes of the MAIN meeting, and from posts that Bonnie has made here in euy2k, I believe skepticism is a reasonable reaction. Further investigation (perhaps an email to MAIN) would be certainly be a logical step in determining the nature and origin of the statement concerning what NERC would report. The MAIN statement may have originated for a number of reasons besides a NERC decision to declare the electric industry Y2K Ready whether Ready or Not. Dan and I offered other possible reasons, but going straight to the source might be helpful.

Lane wrote: I had a great deal more confidence in the utilities before I started reading what pseudonymous "engineers" post on this forum.  Oooh lane, dat hurts! If we industry insiders quit posting now, will you try to be a little more optimistic? Before you say yes just to get rid of us, imagine a world full of y2k speculation, conjecture, and myths, without feedback from those of us who have worked in y2k in the electric industry  what do you have? Thats right, the TimeBomb2000 forum. Without us, there would be no spirited discussions that tend to give all of us at least a little something else to consider. And finally, without industry "polys", whom would the "doomers" bash??? Please reconsider your position here...)

Regards,

-- Anonymous, August 09, 1999

Factfinder wrote:

>If we industry insiders quit posting now, will you try to be a little more optimistic?

Yes, I would. I think the problem would have been taken a lot more seriously and the public would be a lot better prepared if we did not have as many industry insiders telling us it will be fine. Even if every single report made by "industry insiders" is 100% accurate, it is only one piece of anecdotal evidence about one particular person's experience in one particular company in one particular industry.

Power company engineers have no better knowledge of the larger universe of power companies than anyone else, and power company engineers are no better at reading statistical reports than anyone else, and power company engineers are no better than anyone else at understanding how the population will react than anyone else, and power company engineers are no better than anyone else at understanding anything beyond their narrow range of expertise.

>Before you say yes just to get rid of us, imagine a world full of y2k speculation, conjecture, and myths, without feedback from those of us who have worked in y2k in the electric industry  what do you have?

Y2k is a world of speculation, conjecture and myths. Always has been and probably will be right up until rollover. What makes your speculation, conjecture or myths any different or any more valid than anyone else's? Do you really think Y2k is only a technical issue? Do you really think the technical issues are that hard to understand? I think any halfway intelligent person can learn them. The only really hard part for most laypeople to grasp is the scope of the problem and the impact Y2k will have on the economy.

I flog Industry Polly's for two reasons:

1) They come across as arrogant because they seem to think I am incapable of grasping the technical issues.

2) They use their knowledge of the technical issues to assume a mantle of credibility on the non-technical issues. I am a labour market economist who has spent a career studying the impact of technology on business, and specifically employment, so I particularly notice this on economic issues.

Y2k is a technical issue, a management issue, a socialogical issue, a business issue, a psychological issue, a cultural issue and an economic issue. The easiest of all these issues to understand is the technical one. What expertise on those other issues do you have to contribute?

Tom

-- Anonymous, August 10, 1999

I did not just post using the name "Tom Benjamin". But I might as well have. :-)

-- Anonymous, August 10, 1999

you know tom, i really wish that i could 'cut to the chase' the way that you do... you make it seem so easy.

what tom just wrote factfinder, just about sums it all up. do you understand now?

-- Anonymous, August 10, 1999

At times I drift off on a cloud of optimistic wishful thinking, and then I pop over to Deja for Tom's latest postings and a healthy dose of integrity. A Y2K polemicist without equal (IMO). Hope you'll stick around, Tom, to ask the awkward questions and stop the slide into complacency.

-- Anonymous, August 11, 1999

Let him come, whoever this Mr. Swaraj is I am not afraid.

Swaraj is freedom, independence, self-rule; in context, the swaraj is that of India from the British Empire.

"Let us be clear regarding the language we use and the thoughts we nurture. For what is language but the expression of thought? Let your thought be accurate and truthful, and you will hasten the advent of swaraj even if the whole world is against you". Mohandas K. Gandhi.

-- Anonymous, August 11, 1999

Chris wrote:

At times I drift off on a cloud of optimistic wishful thinking, and then I pop over to Deja for Tom's latest postings and a healthy dose of integrity. A Y2K polemicist without equal (IMO). Hope you'll stick around, Tom, to ask the awkward questions and stop the slide into complacency.

I appreciate the comments, but is Y2k strange or what? Here Chris says something really nice about me, but it boils down to "Any time I want to feel really pessimistic and lousy, all I have to do is read some Tom Benjamin." This is not exactly music to a writer's ears.

While I am interested in the power grid, I am more interested in the broader Y2k issues and a lot of what I have to say is off-topic for this particular forum. I just dropped by to pick up Rick and Bonnie's take on the most recent NERC report.

I'll have something to say about that, but I've pretty much exhausted what I have to contribute. (This is probably true for the entire issue. I repeat myself a lot.)

But stop the slide into complacency? Ha-ha-hee-hee-ho-ho, that's a good one! Us Y2k alarmists fought the good fight, but we got pasted. We did not win the hearts and minds and that is what the debate has been about for the past year. I think there are many reasons for this, but it is off-topic and I won't bore you. The slide into complacency has been inexorable. We got murdered.

The debate about Y2k has been like a Roadrunner cartoon. Wile E. Coyote has all the dazzling and clever ideas and carefully puts together the Y2k argument (from ACME of course) and straps it on his back. He lights the TNT in his argument and roars up behind the damn bird. Just as he is about to wrap his hands around that skinny Pollyanna neck, there is a "Beep-beep!", a burst of speed and "Splat!"

I don't know why the real Wile E. Coyote keeps doing it either.

Tom

-- Anonymous, August 11, 1999

Tom, Please keep it up. Y2K frustrates us all to death, but comments like yours are what keep the fighting spirit going in me and others on this forum. I've laughed myself stupid today between reading "Ah-ooga" and the "poly bird", even while I've glazed over thinking about canning 14 twenty-five pound turkeys. Thanks for the stress relief, and for the fellowship of knowing that others are spending a lot of time on this.

-- Anonymous, August 12, 1999