The Big Blackout

THE BIG BLACKOUT

I am writing in support of Supervisor Bohn and Sheriff Honsal’s letter demanding that PG&E explain why the greater Humboldt County area had all of its electricity shut down, when we have a local power plant more than capable of supplying all local our electrical needs, without adding to the threatened larger inland grid.

I have served on the PG&E’s Community Advisory Committee since its inception in 1998, and feel that this community has been misled and now penalized by what has transpired over the past 20 years.  Early on, the CAB worked with the utility in its planning and ultimate construction of the 160MW state of the art gas-fired power plant.  Its 10 engines were designed so that they could be individually turned on and off to meet the power demands at any particular time.  This was important due to the forward thinking that renewables, be they biomass, wind, and solar, with their intermittency, would eventually become major contributors to our local grid.  The plant would also continue to supply voltage regulation to the transmission lines feeding electricity in and out of the county.  We asked, and were assured that the power plant would not run at high capacity sending electricity out of the area for most of the time, since one of our concerns was with the emissions being emitted.  This plant was to be a positive energy project, giving us a cleaner and more local source of electricity.

The issue I am concerned with is why was the local grid not isolated from the main grid that was in danger from the wind and fires?  Was the decision to shut us off and turn the power plant off due to a political directive, a software issue, or simply the lack of mechanical hardware?  I encourage our local leaders to demand those answers, and most importantly, to further demand that whatever actions need to be taken be implemented as soon as possible, since PG&E itself says the PSPS event will probably go on for 10 years or more.

Our electricity future is in a great state of transition due to climate change, cheaper renewables, and rapidly changing technologies.  Locally, it would be ideal to be self-sufficient in our own “microgrid.”  That will probably happen in time with the development of all the rich natural resources we have that can supply us with local, clean, sustainable energy.  But that will take time, money, and most of all the political will of people and leaders.  For now, we need to protect our local economy, our infrastructure, our diverse population, and our environment from large scale, out of the area, decisions that are not in our best interest.  We are Humboldt County, after all!

Mike Manetas