26 Mar
2013
26 Mar
'13
10:25 p.m.
I expect the University of California system to be dismantled, destroyed,
made fairly worthless in the next 10 years. it makes me sad.
On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 6:58 PM, Anon195714 <anon195714(a)sbcglobal.net>wrote;wrote:
Resilience is the ability of a system to withstand shocks and "black swan"
events.
Right now we are seeing the wholesale destruction of systems that in the
past have been far more resilient. This is being done in the name of
profit one one hand, and convenience on the other.
There is no substitute for wires to carry electricity. Nicola Tesla's
broadcast power experiments in Colorado Springs caused disruptions in
nearby cities similar to what would occur from large solar flares. On a
small scale it can work, such as for resonant charging stations for
electric vehicles, built into every parking space with a meter (deposit $3
to park, and optionally another $3 for a quick wireless recharge). But it
is highly likely that injecting huge quantities of energy into the
atmosphere, on the scale required for industrial civilization (think of
where your fork and spoon come from) would have unforeseen and probably
destructive ecological consequences.
So between here and some hypothetical Mr. Fusion machine in our basements,
we're stuck with wires.
The question is how to manage those wires so they, and the rest of the
power control infrastructure, don't become high-value targets.
The simplest solution from an engineering perspective, is neighborhood
power. Every block has its own grid, with solar roofs on every house, a
small battery pack in every house, and connections to the larger grid or
perhaps a shared natural gas turbine or nuclear battery of about 30 to 50
KW output. Now try to get that to happen with the present real estate
situation: it's a non-starter. A selfish ass halfway down one street,
would be sufficient to block it. Zoning codes wouldn't even know what to
do about it.
Municipal ownership of the wires on public rights-of-way would be a great
thing. Now try getting the voters to approve an eminent domain buy-out of
PG&E's wires, or an expensive project to run all new wires under the
streets.
The blunt fact is, WE the geeks, the engineers and technicians, builders,
makers, and hackers, have the smarts and the skills to come up with
something that will work and that will stand up to shocks. BUT the hands
that control the money flows have no interest or incentive to let us do
so.
This doesn't even require overt malevolence, just a "business as usual"
and "ho-hum" attitude, of the kind that is common among people who have
never worried about putting food on their own tables, much less considered
what life would be like with frequent power outages (some of them lasting
hours, some lasting days or weeks).
So frankly I'm at a loss for a conclusive answer to this one.
When it comes to resilient telecoms, we can set up community mesh and back
it up with small cheap solar panels to keep it running during power
outages.
But when it comes to power as such, for lights and fridges and cooking,
there is no equivalent of community mesh. Yet.
There are times when I think we'll just have to go through a major
catastrophe before we realize that we have to build resilient
infrastructure.
It took the Loma Prieta quake and videos of sections of the Bay Bridge
collapsed, before California got off its collective arse and built a new
span. But there are other instances where entire bridges, not maintained
due to stingy taxpayers and pandering politicians, simply collapsed, even
during rush hour.
This one happened five years ago:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C31IlOHNzbM
If Al Qaeda or North Korea or a Hayward Fault quake hit the "smart grid,"
there won't be any dramatic video. There'll just be darkness and food
going bad in our fridges.
Perhaps that would encourage people to go out at night and gaze at the
sky. Perhaps the awesome view of the Milky Way in all its splendor, would
inspire a new interest in space exploration, and with it, a new interest in
science and technology generally.
In any case it would be a good thing if the members of Bay Area
hackerspaces could put our heads together to come up with some practical
solutions to this one.
-G.
=====
On 13-03-26-Tue 5:28 PM, Anthony Di Franco wrote:
To be clear, I don't mean to say "no grids!1!!1!!!" but just "use
large-scale grids only for what they're best for in the context of a
broader heterogeneous system, not for almost everything as they are now,
and take into account in a rigorous way overall system efficiency and other
concerns like vulnerability to failures both routine and rare and
corruptibility of the social systems that grow up around the technical
systems."
I remember discussing these points a few times in the past with you,
George, and Hol, and others around sudo room; might we like to get some
documentation together on interesting specifics? A section of the wiki
maybe, where we can throw ideas up about the details and see what sticks?
On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 5:06 PM, Anon195714 <anon195714(a)sbcglobal.net>wrote;wrote:
A lot of the arguement against power grids is ultimately rooted in
opposition to having our energy supply controlled by distant corporations
whose decisions are not sustainable and not in our interests.
I agree that over-dependence on greedy corporations for vital
infrastructure, merely for the sake of convenience, is a shortcut to
servitude. Google is the worst offender, with its seductive Gmail and
Google Voice offering "convenience" in exchange for intensive and intrusive
surveillance, not only of those who use the services, but of everyone they
communicate with. (Worst of all, Google Glass: "become a volunteer
surveillance drone!")
The model we should be looking toward, to manage the power grid, is one
of municipally-owned transmission infrastructure (the wires along the
streets), and diversification of power producers (from individual
households to the existing power utilities). Everyone would be paid the
same rate for power they "upload" to the grid, and everyone would pay the
same rate for power they "download." This would immediately level the
playing field and provide an enormous incentive for all manner of renewable
and new-tech power generation.
Further, the municipal ownership model should also apply to the wired
telecoms grid: telephone and internet. (Even your mobile device is only
"wireless" for the last half mile at most; the rest of the way it's as
wired as my antique dial phones.) All of these things are using the public
rights-of-way along the streets; they are arguably public rights-of-way in
themselves, and as such, should be owned by the public.
The municipal internet of electricity would entail each local power
producer (household or larger) having small storage capacity on-site, and a
switching synchronized inverter to connect to the grid. An onboard
microprocessor with an analog voltage sensors would monitor line power to
determine when power should be uploaded to the grid or downloaded from the
grid. Simple "net metering" would keep track of the billing.
The small decentralized battery packs would act primarily as buffers, to
level out power production and consumption among users. Overnight and over
multiple cloudy days, and during peak demand hours, the decentralized solar
would be supplemented by other power sources such as micro-reactors and
natural gas turbines.
The uniform pricing mechanism would prevent predatory "arbitrage" of
electricity, and provide the incentive to install solar panels on every
solar-accessible flat surface, even on bus shelters and other street
kiosks.
The point-of-production microprocessors would be isolated from the
internet to prevent cyber-attacks against the grid: the best kind of "smart
grid" is one that self-regulates locally without being vulnerable
globally.
I should also mention: Yes, electric automobiles can provide household
power storage in the absence of having a grid, but a) not everyone owns or
even wants an automobile, b) if you've drained your car battery pack
overnight to power your house, it's not available the next morning to get
you to work, and c) even if everyone could afford a new electric car, there
are good reasons to reduce car ownership and usage in favor of bicycles,
scooters, motorcycles, buses, and trains.
Beyond that, we should not be destroying our civic infrastructure in
favor of requiring everyone to have their own i-Things or do without.
Public phones, public bathrooms (do you really want to carry an i-Pee
around?), public drinking fountains, public benches for sitting, public
transport, etc.: are all civic goods that make the public sphere more
user-friendly and accessible. A public power grid is another example, as
with public water supply, public sewage treatment, and refuse disposal:
life without those things would be worse than miserable.
Don't destroy it: reclaim it, revision it, and rebuild it.
-G.
=====
On 13-03-26-Tue 3:41 PM, Anthony Di Franco wrote:
Production of alternative energy can be and for most reasons probably
should be much less centralized, equivalently, smaller-scale, than
production of energy mostly is now. (Off-grid, as you mention, but very
literally.)
Large-scale up front + large, complex distribution networks is revealed
as an obsolete architecture; large scale distribution networks become
relatively less important, so even if the answer to your question is no,
which it probably isn't given crowdfunding and other disintermediated
finance gaining momentum, it's moot, or at least of much less relative
importance.
Put another way, when the most important goal is maximum efficiency
rather than maximum centralization, large upfront capital investment +
large, complex distribution network is stupid; proper
accounting<https://homebrewindustrialrevolution.wordpress.com/>of all costs and
benefits in a global rather than piecewise local sense
reveals this now for agriculture, manufacturing, energy, ...
Even now, buffering between supply and demand is a constraint on grid
architecture leading to great economic demand within the current paradigm
for distributed storage / production of energy according to someone who
came through sudo room whose name escapes me.
This loosely-drafted email brought to you by the
slogan<http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2010/11/eaas…ml>,
"localize production, virtualize everything
else"<http://www.miiu.org/wiki/Resilient_Things_by_Top-Level_Catego… and
the acronym STEMI <http://www.accelerationwatch.com/mest.html>
compression<http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2008/11…
.
On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 3:17 PM, Romy Ilano <romy(a)snowyla.com> wrote:
Is it possible to create alternative energy
distribution networks
(biofuels/solar/ wind etc) that replace mainstream petrol and natural gas
based energy without a large financial sector?
the vc system that funds these alternative energy start-ups piggy
backs off the investment banks, etc. and big private equity and
institutional investment funds. vcs are like a fly on the @ss of a
financial hippo.
I haven't heard people discuss off-grid that much in the tech talks
I've been to( which are excellent). Is there a conversation here that would
show how off grid is a viable alternative, even if it's not a big money
solution?
On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 1:56 PM, <hol(a)gaskill.com> wrote:
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this talk about imports and exports always
reminds me of energy flow
compare 2011
https://www.llnl.gov/news/newsreleases/2012/Oct/images/25306_LLNLUSEnergy20…
with 2002
http://www.hubbertpeak.com/us/images/us_energyflow2002.jpg
fascinating
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