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Commercial_Case_7475 t1_jci7a6c wrote

Trust me, you'd rather lose power for a few hours or days, vs the weeks it would take to find out where the fuck that root busted up the conduit underground. It's a terrible idea to bury power lines long distances in Vermont especially.

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suzi-r t1_jcikj9h wrote

I agree 100% plus, the costs to do it are extraordinary. For what—the view? We have Photoshop.

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4eververmonter OP t1_jcz90u3 wrote

I don't see where buried lines would be a part of the plan. How about more maintenance of the trees close to the lines. A bit more of that and less costly than restoration. Preventative action.

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DirtyBirdNJ t1_jci7gtn wrote

It's getting easier and easier to set up solar and battery storage at home. Build your own powerwall and have backup for a few days if you size things for your usage.

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MYrobouros t1_jcibp8z wrote

Not to mention GMP subsidizes that stuff for consumers. I'm sure that helps their bottom line but the micro-grid incentives are cool

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landodk t1_jck08lq wrote

Do they still have that program?

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Galadrond t1_jcspnbg wrote

Last time I checked they had about $50,000,000 lying around from the pandemic money to help people with this sort of thing.

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IndigoHG t1_jciizzm wrote

"Build your own powerwall"

How...? Given this current outage, I'm curious about doing this, but how? Can I - should I - go to GMP with questions, or hit up Efficiency VT?

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DirtyBirdNJ t1_jcik92t wrote

Start by looking up what an MPPT box does. You can build a smaller setup that powers something less demanding than your house.

You could build a battery bank out of big heavy car batteries, it wouldn't be as pretty but it would work to get you started.

Getting the wiring to your house is something only a licensed electrician should do, but the short version (ha ha) is there is a kind of toggle switch they install that will let you disconnect from the grid and draw power from the bank. This is important for situations where you don't wanna be putting electricity back into the grid (power line repair for example).

Tl:Dr MPPT + inverter + batteries + solar panels. It's not rocket science but the Tesla powerwall are really nice if u can afford it

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landodk t1_jck0ghk wrote

A battery in each house is probably cheaper, easier, more reliable and more climate friendly

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elpvtam t1_jcir8x5 wrote

Yes they probably need to do a bit more trimming but this is Vermont. Sometimes the power goes out. It's always been this way. This storm was well predicted and big. GMP has done a great job getting people back online

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GraniteGeekNH t1_jci1z0i wrote

Hunt around - there are lots of discussions about the pros and cons of burying power lines which I think is what you're getting at.

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vermont4runner t1_jci4021 wrote

Underground cables in New England is folly. We have to go deeper than 4ft to get around frost heaving. Not to mention New England soil is incredibly rocky and shifting.

Better line management and tree trimming is absolutely required. But your proposal for underground utilities is half baked.

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Twombls t1_jci49nr wrote

The town of shelburne and stowe did bury cables within a lot of their town center. It was expensive af.

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vermont4runner t1_jci5nwk wrote

Right, because they had to go extra deep and the conduit has to be reinforced. It’s not feasible for the vast majority of places.

Shelburne and Stowe are two of the most expensive towns in Vermont. They are trying to project that image of wealth and perfection, they’ll pay to bury the lines out of pure vanity.

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NoMidnight5366 t1_jciej1w wrote

Not to mention all the conduits filling up with water.

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DaddyBobMN t1_jclm86u wrote

Where I grew up 90% of local power lines are buried and "conduits filling with water" simply isn't a thing anyone worries about.

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Optimized_Orangutan t1_jci3iwe wrote

Ya... And it's a terrible idea.

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Twombls t1_jci41bw wrote

I mean its a good idea. Our tiny rural state just cant afford it. Also if we did bury them I doubt the people that are effected the most would get their lines buried as they are usually like the last house in bumfuck nowhere up a single line.

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Optimized_Orangutan t1_jci5bq1 wrote

That's why it's a bad idea. We will spend huge amounts of money burying all the lines that don't need it and the same people will still lose power.

Edit: burying the lines doesn't eliminate or even reduce maintenance cost either... So you spend a bunch of money digging the lines and then you don't even get a payback from upkeep cost reductions.

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Twombls t1_jci4t3c wrote

This has been a problem as long as I've lived here. We could bury the lines. However its incredibly expensive. And the people who get hit the worst tend to live way out up a mountainside or something so their lines would never get buried anyway.

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4eververmonter OP t1_jci7j34 wrote

Would it be more cost effective in the midterm..actually pay for cutting back arround the lines? Rather than buring or paying th ot needed for restoration?

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E123334 t1_jciq7an wrote

What is the threshold? How much specifically are you willing to pay for less outage time? Would you pay 20% more on your bill every month for an 8hr reduction in outage time per year on average? I’m not trying to troll I’m genuinely curious what your thoughts are.

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4eververmonter OP t1_jcz9oo7 wrote

Let's tally the cost of restoration. Reduce that by,??and budget it for tree maintenance to prevent the damage. Should be at least attempted in areas that are prone to costly, constant (not just this one storm) restoration. Maybe a pilot program?

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Twombls t1_jci7wjp wrote

Probably doing some cutting along the lines. Encouraging people to get a good propane generator or battery bank.

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coldnight3 t1_jcid9zp wrote

Did you put a generator and ATS in your corrective plan / budget request if they are looking for 99.99+ uptime? That is your solution - or cloudify everything you can and "make" employees pay for local generation - which, won't fly, I'm willing to bet.

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druunavt t1_jcmlipe wrote

I live way out on a mountainside. About 10 years ago the power company finally put the poles along the roads --before that they had to backpack into the woods to fix the lines. Now we're only ever out for a few hours. The last time we were out for over a day was that bad Thanksgiving storm in 2018.

I also have a little inverter generator that runs on propane or gas that has a weatherproof tent so I can put it a safe distance from my house, and a bunch of quality extension cords and a little battery backup that can run the router for a few hours (which is all I really ever use). Eventually I'd love to buy solar panels and a battery bank.

It's perfectly dealable and totally not worth burying lines for. I doubt they'd stay stable and be a more sustainable solution anyway. The things that I have had heave in this ground, and the rocks whenever we've dug into it...

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