Hi everyone. I was at a Christmas party this weekend and the following information came to me via a key person in the utilities industry. 1) If the electrical power grid requires a black start it would be next to impossible without communications between major generating plants. 2) If the electrical grid goes down and then is brought back up the furnaces on the natural gas grid will all kick in at the same time and the sudden drop on the natural gas system will think that a major break has occured and shut down the pilot light. So if you have a person who has no knowledge of how to relight the pilot they could freeze anyway even though the gas is on and the power has come backup. louie m.

-- louie miotti (louie.miotti@sait.ab.ca), December 14, 1998

Answers

That's an intriging story, Louie. A good illustration of the Law of Unintended Consequences. Everything Is Connected.

On a possibly related note: the newest Kiplingers magazine (focus on 1999) has a piece on the effects of Y2K. It's not online yet, but I quickly skimmed it at the newstand yesterday and one sidebar snippet leapt out at me. It presented as fact (but without atribution), that most of the Natural Gas pressure monitors used in distributing gas at the neighborhood level are currently not Y2K capable. It went on to say that explosions are a possibility!

Now this is pretty high-powered stuff to toss around without naming sources, but the rest of the article seemed pretty level-headed. I'm not a regular reader of Kiplinger's, so I don't have a sense of there journalistic standards. And a disclaimer: I was reading it with screaming kids, a nasty cold and late for an appointment so if I've presented minor errors in my summary, be gentle.

PLEASE: Don't any of you put this out as God's Own Truth until someone can find some corraboration. There are enough Urban Legends out there already. (Non-compliant Microwaves my arse. )

-- Lewis (aslanshow@yahoo.com), December 14, 1998.

More likely, you are getting mixed refrences between the very power plant burners, and the small household gas furnace burners. The local (user level) natural gas burners that use a bimetallic strip/sensor to detect the flame.

I'll do some test to determine effect of power/no power to the local gas house-sized furnace. Don't know the answer, but I suspect that "no power" does not cut out the pilot light.

The many small burners coming back on are at the ends of a very long distribution network that will tend to mitigate the pressure drop - even when many furnaces come back on at once.

-- Robert A. Cook, P.E. (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), December 14, 1998.

"I'll do some test to determine effect of power/no power to the local gas house-sized furnace. Don't know the answer, but I suspect that "no power" does not cut out the pilot light. "

Speaking from personal experiance...it doesn't

Rick

-- Rick Tansun (ricktansun@hotmail.com), December 14, 1998.

But "no power" will also disable the thermostat controlling the furnace, not so? And of course the furnace blower itself. And then what?

What happens to the gas flow to a home heating system if the furnace is running when the power goes out? This can happen even in ordinary circumstances, so there must be functional fail-safes in the present systems. Whatever these are, do they have microo-processors?

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), December 15, 1998.

Then there those LUCKY people with the high efficiency central gas furnaces which are totally spark ignited, no pilot at all. Darn!!

cr

-- Chuck a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), December 15, 1998.

Ref: Loss of power.

Given that the pilot light stays on. Losing power => lose blower => burner starts when the house gets cold => overheats central furnace unit (the area immediately around the heat exchange area in the furnace) => trips automatic safety switch (non-embedded chip - its a mechanical type thermostat switch) => safety trip cuts off the gas supply to the burner. Pilot light stays lit.

Result is a hot furnace and a cold house.

Most house thermostats are 12v or 24v, driven from a ac-dc convertor from house current. Haven't tried the reaction to the thermostat to loss of power. Most likely = no signal, no "trip" signal to the furnace to start the burner.

-- Robert A. Cook, P.E. (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), December 15, 1998.

Do a Deja News search of the following: Subject: Oil, Gas, Water, SCADA, SAT and Y2K Email: dfletch@geocities.com Date: 1998/09/04 Forums: comp.software.year-2000

Then read Enron's SEC disclosure.

Frightening.

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), December 15, 1998.