I've heard two stories on the timing of the electrical grid:

1) The rollover will affect each time zone individually, time zone by time zone,

2) All grids are set to GMT, so we won't have any 'warnings' from Japan, NZ, Australia, etc. If it goes, it goes in one flash.

Any grid experts here? Inquiring Kooks wanna know.

I o'pollygize in advance if this was discussed in detail previously, I just happened to miss it.

Spark Chaser Kook

-- Y2Kook (y2kook@usa.net), December 20, 1999

Answers

KooK:

Actually, both are correct. It depends where you are. Technically, there are other possibilities [too site specific to go into].

Best wishes,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), December 20, 1999.

Mr. Z., I was born, but it wasn't yesterday. If you would please bring your knowledge to the level of folks who have expertise in other areas, but not in the grid and such. And kindly, in laymens terms, explain what you know and understand. My expertise in in the financial arena(no,not stocks)If you come to me and ask me to explain my arena, I would do so, in the simplest terms I could muster, in order for you to be able to grasp/understand my situation and the consequences. I am asking of you, the same.

-- Asking (someexperts@onething.com), December 20, 1999.

Y2Kook,

Here's what one article has to say about this. I haven't seen much hard info out there on this subject.

http://www.capitolalert.com/news/old/capalert01_19990927.html

[snip]

The reaction could be influenced not only by Y2K problems developing in Asia, Europe and Africa, which will ring out 1999 ahead of the United States, but also in this country. A large chunk of the nation's electric grid, for example, operates on Greenwich Mean Time, meaning its computers will flip over to 01/01/00 at 7 p.m. Eastern time on New Year's Eve.

[snip]

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), December 20, 1999.

Am I to understand with all the illustrious brains we have on this forum no one can say for sure what the situation is in a few other countries?

It would be very nice to know that at least one of the following do not run on GMT so that we can get an advance warning and also not be fooled that everything went ok on the rollover on these countries. Because if they run on GMT the power problem will come AFTER their local rollovers.

New Zealand Australia Japan Honk Kong Singapore Malaysia Brunei India Saudi Arabia Quatar Scandinavia and other countries of Western Europe east of England.

-- Interested Spectator (is@the_ring.side), December 20, 1999.

I would like to add a third question to Kook's list:

3) Do the mainframes and embedded systems controlling the grid use any look ahead features (for maintance or whatever) that could fail, and bring down the grid well before the roll over?

-- Ocotillo (peeling@out.===), December 21, 1999.

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0022gd

[snip]

MIT originally planned to shut down all its elevators for 30-minute periods straddling both the Greenwich Mean Time change to 2000, occurring at 7 p.m. New Year's Eve in Boston, and again for 30 minutes beginning at 11:45 p.m. on the 31st.

That plan was based on fears that power failures related to Y2K could leave someone stuck between floors if they happened to be riding an elevator right as midnight arrived in London or Boston. Tests have shown the computer chips in elevator microprocessors throughout the campus are fine, and MIT's own power plant, which serves most of the campus, is expected to be fully Y2K-ready, Isaacson said.

Isaacson said officials have since concluded that ''the cure may have been worse than the potential problem'' and will leave elevators running all of New Year's Eve. But, he said, ''We have elevator mechanics who are normally on call who will be on site'' to work on any problems that arise.

[snip]

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), December 21, 1999.

Y2Kook,

I am sitting at the Dispatch desk in our area control room right now, and as its a quiet time of night I can answer your questions, and with some authority.

The computer I am typing this meassage on, and which is connected to our LAN and WAN, is operating on New Zealand Daylight Saving Time (NZDT) which is 13 hours ahead of GMT.

On my left is an embedded system (Honeywell Scan3000) which is used to control sluice gates at a remote dam. It is also on NZDT.

Immediately to my right is our dispatch computer which is also on NZDT.

Next two screens on my right are for the Scada which is currently running in the year 2000, and has been for some time.

Next is a high level embedded system (Allen-Bradley) which monitors any alarms. It is running on NZDT.

Next is a remote control system (Streats) which is running in the year 1989 because we have been unable to get it remediated in time.

Next is our hydrological and meteorology system which is running on New Zealand Standard time (12 hours ahead of GMT).

Immediately above the desk is our frequency keeping system which shows the grid time and any deviation. It is also reading NZDT.

No, there is nothing here on GMT.

Incidentally, I did spend some years working as a Grid Controller, and I can assure you that no part of NEW Zealands grid runs on GMT. Contact that I have had with other people in the industry from various points around the world suggest that the only places where the grids do use GMT are those which lay very close to the line of 0 degrees Longitude, and have GMT as their local time. I have seen no data that suggests that any USA utilities or grids have their systems set to GMT.

Malcolm

-- Malcolm taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), December 21, 1999.

How's your weather, Malcolm?

-- Rider (Wake@Dawn's.smile), December 21, 1999.

Rider, Its overcast and warm, with no rain showing up on the satelite image untill at least friday. Looks like it could be another lovely summers day tomorrow.

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), December 21, 1999.

Just a thought, and in no way an attempt to slam anyone who's mentioned GMT/UTC before, but I'm wondering if there might be some accidental disinfo floating about.

A lot of things DO run on GMT, so maybe there has been some conclusion-jumping, regarding what time the grid is set to? I have yet to see anything authoritative that says it's set to GMT - just speculation. I for one would like to see something definitive, on the issue.

Thanks to Malcolm for providing that info, on NZ.

-- Bokonon (bok0non@my-Deja.com), December 21, 1999.

Malcolm's infor is "correct" for the US too. We don't use GMT (UTC). We use local time.

-- The Engineer (The Engineer@tech.com), December 21, 1999.

Further to my note yesterday on the time that all of our different systems are running on, I just happened to note the date in 2000 that our SCADA is showing. It thinks today is Feb 29th 2000. So no Y2k issues there.

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), December 22, 1999.