Well, there's some good news. Rick Cowles, the foremost expert on Y2K and the power grid, thinks it's unlikely the nation's power grid will go down. He does say there is a likelihood of widespread power shortages and rolling blackouts or brownouts in various regions. I find this very reassuring, because obviously electricity is one of the most important issues. It doesn't mean "everything will be fine" or that we shouldn't still prepare, but it's reassuring to know that there is no likelihood of a total blackout on a national scale. You can find Cowles' interview at:

http://www.cbn.org/y2k/cowles.htm

-- Geoffrey Smith (gsmith@tidepool.com), January 11, 1999

Answers

I also suggest that anyone concerned about the power grid should read this article at WorldNetDaily's site:

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/bluesky_exnews/19990111_xex_bad_news_pow. shtml

"Bad news -- National Guard, FEMA plan for major Y2K breakdowns"

-- Kevin (mixesmusic@worldnet.att.net), January 11, 1999.

This idea of the national grid going down may be irrelevant and a matter of semantics. There are already power companies talking about disconnecting from the national grid in order to be sure they can service their areas. On the one hand, disconnecting may be the best way to ensure that some areas will be safe, on the other hand, if this happens, then "the grid" goes down.

-- a (b@c.def), January 11, 1999.

An EUY2K poster said this:

"I just found out that the quarterly y2k readines report from the North American Electric Reliability Council will be presented at the National Press Club (http://www.press.org/) today at 1:30 PM EST."

That was 4 minutes ago it started; comparing this Q's with last Q's should clear up some things. It can do three things: get better, get worse or not change, right? I expect some "there, there, calm down" intonations in this release, along with "good" remediation news.

-- Lisa (lisab@shallc.com), January 11, 1999.

There was an article in the Boston Globe this weekend (No Seeing the Light Yet on Utilities' Y2K Plans) reporting on the local utilities' briefing of businesses in the area. The wire story (AP) that ran based on this article was titled BLACK OUT?: Utility companies brace for 2000.' The utility won't say they'll make it. And they won't say they won't make it. What the article does say is that their schedule has slipped.

There have been similar stories in recent weeks about other utility companies slipping their completion dates. (At Resilience 2000: News we've got clippings of articles from Bangor Maine, to Sweden, to Alberta Canada, to Russia ... none of which give me a warm and fuzzy feeling.)

Of particular concern to me were remarks by John Koskinen in a recent USA TODAY article, Y2K: Minor Glitch or Major Disaster?: We are deeply concerned about the railroads ... We have no indication that they are going to make it. Without the railroads power generation will be at risk.

When anyone predicts the future we ought to be grateful for their assessment. But we ought to hold firm to the knowledge that they may or may not be right.

When I read the growing list of stories I think there is little cause at this point for a sense of relief .. even if Roleigh Martin is saying he thinks the grid will be ok.

You can read all of these articles at Resilience 2000 (http://www.resilience2000.com).

-- Ron Rodgers (RonRodgers@Resilience2000.com), January 11, 1999.

And here's the agenda for the NERC February workshop in Dallas, where they'll be discussing the quarterly report's findings

ftp://ftp.nerc.com/pub/sys/all_updl/docs/y2k/y2k-workshop-0299.pdf

-- Lisa (lisab@shallc.com), January 11, 1999.

Thanks Lisa.

The National Press Club hotlink:

http://www.press.org/

Wow!!! Very interesting little Directory of News Sources used for searching for expert news source contacts:

http://www.press.org/sources/< /a>

How fun! Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), January 11, 1999.

Other way around - at least on the East Coast lines: if no power, then the railroads and subways are down for the count. They are all electric over there.

Midwest and West are almost all diesel railroads. Subways are relatively limited too - as far as impact outside of the major cities is concerned. However, even diesel rail yards require swithcing and control and lights, diesel fuel pumping, scheduling computrs, radios, telephones, etc to manage freight. With these down, or severely disrupted, it will be extremely difficuly to ship things accurately and on time.

And that hurts other businesses severely.

-- Robert A. Cook, P.E. (Kennesaw GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), January 11, 1999.

"Got Kerosene?"

-- E. Coli (nunayo@beeswax.com), January 11, 1999.

I suppose my walnut-sized brain is missing something, but today's NERC report killed about 4/5 of my fear of power failing.

If the report is valid, today I have moved from a 9 back to a 3.

Anybody else cheered by the report?

-- Lisa (lisab@shallc.com), January 11, 1999.

Lisa,

What did you read in the NERC report that made you so confident things won't be so bad? While I'll admit that I haven't had time to read all the report yet, one little point did catch my eye: "Will the lights go out? The answer is that no one knows for certain yet what the effects of Y2k will be" (p. A-2).

Not exactly a cause for celebration in my view. Please let me know what you saw that made you so much more optimistic.

-- Nabi Davidson (nabi7@yahoo.com), January 11, 1999.

The bottom line: how will Y2K play out for power?

PARKHILL: Bottom line. Right now it doesn't seem likely to me that the entire grid will go down, but instead that we're definitely going to be looking at various types of shortages of power, whether it's rolling blackouts or brownouts throughout regions and areas. Do you agree with that, and how long do you think it's likely to last?

COWLES: First off, I agree with that assessment, that, depending upon where you live, your mileage may vary. It depends on the energy mix in a region of the country- by energy mix, I mean the type of generation that's inherent to that region.

This is GOOD news??? Wow, you people's definitions are strange...

-- Randy Gordon (grandy@hotmail.com), January 11, 1999.

A couple of things to keep in mind:

Rolling brownouts (aka unstable power with varying voltages) can seriously damage a lot of electrical equipment. Those of you with heat pumps should either protect them with whole house surge protectors, or, just throw the breaker and leave it off until the situation sorts itself out. (Personal experience, had a compressor give up the ghost from chronic undervoltage.)

Second, become knowlegeable about your local utility. Read the NRC data (if relevant). Remember, TEOTWAWKI is a local event relative to any individual. If the power goes off for 2 weeks in New York City that will be TEOTWAWKI for those people no matter what happens in Chicago or LA.

Third, NERC is controlled by the utilities. It is a private organization, not part of the Federales. That confusion has been used by the industry to validate its happyface reports.

-- RD. ->H (drherr@erols.com), January 11, 1999.

dont just think of utilities. Think rails,oil,telcos,banking,etc.

-- dave (wootendave@hotmail.com), January 11, 1999.

Read what Bonnie Camp has to say on the thread on the Utility forum http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=000MSN

-- Peabody (work@it.net), January 12, 1999.

Nabi, maybe what Lisa saw was just this:

Although there is clearly much more work to be done, says Michehl R. Gent, NERC President, we have found that North Americas electric power supply and delivery systems are well on their way to being Y2k Ready. What weve seen to this point suggests that the rollover to the Year 2000 will create only a minimal impact on electric system operations. Impacts found so far include nuisance errors, like incorrect dates in logs or displays on a monitor. Computer errors found thus far, he says, do not appear likely to threaten electricity supplies to customers. Live tests of remediated electric generators, according to the report, have resulted in zero critical failures that would have caused the shutdown of power systems.

-- Blue Himalayan (bh@k2.y), January 12, 1999.