U.S. power plant has minor Y2K glitch, no outage

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A power plant in the U.S. Midwest experienced a date-related computer glitch Friday after passing midnight Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), but electricity supply was not disrupted and the problem was fixed quickly, electric industry officials said.

A calendar clock coordinating generation and transmission systems jumped ahead 35 days at the plant, but was corrected in a few minutes and did not affect customers or disrupt power, said John Castagna, a spokesman for the Edison Electric Institute.

Nearly one-third of all U.S. electric utilities have their operations timed to GMT, which passed midnight at 7 p.m. EST.

The Midwest utility, which was not named, was the only facility timed to GMT to see any glitches, Castagna said.

``Everyone else reported normal operations,'' Castagna said.

The Edison Electric Institute is the trade association for U.S. shareholder-owned utilities, the largest power providers in the country.

20:48 12-31-99

-- streamer (streamer@aol.com), December 31, 1999

Answers

HA! My bet is that is was ComEd.

-- Mello1 (mello1@ix.netcom.com), December 31, 1999.

"1/3 of the U.S. power plants run on GMT."

Says: 1. 2/3 yet to roll over in the U.S.

2. do they run on GMT in other parts of the world? Could have surprises then AFTER their celebrations.

-- W (me@home.now), December 31, 1999.

1. 2/3 yet to roll over in the U.S.

2. do they run on GMT in other parts of the world? Could have surprises then AFTER their celebrations.

-- W (me@home.now)

Uh, W, The whole world has already rolled over on GMT.

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), December 31, 1999.