[pulpfiction]

..and what efforts have been made by CL&P to begin to modernize our infrastructure?

Originally Posted by Cambium

Instead of starting a new thread I figure I post this here...

I won't get into the why's or the possibilities but IF the pattern we have on hand (which has been same last 7 months) continues, there's no doubt we will have another and maybe worse winter. But I've seen patterns change fast so there's plenty of time for a flip.

These guys are saying New England could experience brown outs this winter.

So are you prepared if so?

Get Ready for the New England Power Shortage | The American Spectator

[Lalalally]

I've been living in CT for 19 years. I'm in northern Fairfield County, and for me the worst (by FAR) was the early/freak October snowstorm. I never saw as many trees down in this area as I did then. EVER. We were without electricity for 1 week, I think (funny how now I can't remember exactly how long it was, because at the time I thought I would never (ever) forget. But alas I have... I say 1 week because I do know we just missed the window for the CL&P reimbursement -- I remember if you were still without power by noon on such-and-such date, you would get a $100 credit from CL&P. Our power came back on at 10:00 a.m. on that day. So we missed getting the credit by 2 hours.
Prior to that storm though, I think the longest we ever went without electric was about 1.5 to 2 days max (two days following the remnants of hurricane Irene, which I think was earlier that same year as the October storm.) Usually though it would only be for up to a few hours - until 2011, that is. After the October storm, we had one other extended outage, and that was following Sandy. That one lasted 4 days. Knock wood, we haven't lost power since. Fingers crossed that they're wrong about the predicted brown outs, though I'm sure they're not. Very glad we have a generator -- I wouldn't trade it for the world

[Wilton2ParkAve]

Originally Posted by pulpfiction

..and what efforts have been made by CL&P to begin to modernize our infrastructure?

Lots of tree trimming and some new poles/rewiring. Upgraded transformers. I have a little more faith since there were no power outages for the blizzard in Feb 2013. 20-40" with wind and no issues.

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by Wilton2ParkAve

Lots of tree trimming and some new poles/rewiring. Upgraded transformers. I have a little more faith since there were no power outages for the blizzard in Feb 2013. 20-40" with wind and no issues.

The difference with the '13 storm, and someone correct me if I'm wrong, is the snow was fluffy vs heavy, and there weren't leaves on the trees to weigh down branches.

[Lalalally]

Originally Posted by Wilton2ParkAve

Lots of tree trimming and some new poles/rewiring. Upgraded transformers. I have a little more faith since there were no power outages for the blizzard in Feb 2013. 20-40" with wind and no issues.

We had 40" of snow last year? Why do I not remember this??!! I must be getting old - LOL!!!

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by Lalalally

We had 40" of snow last year? Why do I not remember this??!! I must be getting old - LOL!!!

The New Haven area down to about Milford had 40" in the Feb. '13 blizzard. I don't believe the Danbury area got as much.

[Cambium]

There's a lot of interesting things in that article, hard to pick and choose.

First of all, we don't get power outages with snowstorms in the winter UNLESS its heavy wet snow or a blizzard with whipping winds.

Second of all ... I believe they (the article) is talking about demand for it rather then local storm issues. I do remember last winter states were running out of Nat Gas.

However.. how does winter affect the grid more than summer would? Electric Baseboard heat? Furnaces don't use much even if they are on non stop. So what drives the demand for electric that we have to expect brown outs??

If I'm reading right... our capacity and load is not enough to support the population now?

Some tid bits..

"Last week the governors of the six New England states met in an emergency session at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to discuss what to do about the pending crisis. Significantly, they asked the premiers of five of Canada’s provinces to attend. That makes sense because if the region is going to get electricity from anywhere it is probably going to be from north of the border."

"New England is now limping along with 33,000 megawatts of electrical capacity, which barely meets its needs. At one auction last winter, the New England Independent Systems Operator, which manages the grid, came up 145 megawatts short — an almost unheard of occurrence. Yet in the next two years the region will be closing down 1/10[SIZE=2]th of its capacity in a bid to rid itself of anything that does not win favor with environmentalists"[/SIZE]

"Last winter, when record low temperatures hit, there just wasn’t enough gas to go around"

[Lalalally]

Ok, yes. Your mention of Milford jogged my memory -- I do remember they did get slammed with snow. But I think that same storm in the Danbury/New Fairfield area was a non-event in comparison -- maybe like 17" -- 18" max. Big, but not historic. Now the Christmas 2002 (?) storm -- that one I remember!

[Cambium]

Since it was brought up... As far as snowfall total in that 2013 Blizzard Here's the final snow total map using all reports from the state NWS, Co-op, personal.

Use the 30-40" area as close to 30" mostly with some local areas getting upper 30s.
http://www.wxedge.com/articles/20130...ruary_8-9_2013




http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/news/evalua...snowfall-index




It wasn't fluffy....it wasn't heavy. Normal weight snow for the area.. 11:1 ratios
(BDR 30 inches of snow melted to 2.60" liquid)

[Lalalally]

Thanks for posting this Cam. So I was not too far off on the guesstimate for my area It always amazes me that for such a small state, we all experience (vastly) different weather!