When The Lights Went Out (2012)

[Eliecer Brathwaite]

Minutesafter Jones gave the Ravens a 28-6 lead on the second-half kickoff, the lights went out in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Some backup lighting remained on, but play was stopped for about 34 minutes, and the international television broadcast was interrupted.

A statement from Entergy and the Superdome said that a piece of equipment monitoring electrical load sensed the abnormality and opened a breaker, partially cutting power. The statement said backup generators kicked in before full power could be restored.

"The power outage was an unfortunate moment in what has been an otherwise shining Super Bowl week for the city of New Orleans,'" Mayor Mitch Landrieau said. "In the coming days, I expect a full after-action report from all parties involved.

FBI special agent Michael Anderson said terrorism was not the cause of the power outage and dismissed reports of a fire as a cause. In addition, New Orleans Fire Department spokesman Michael Williams said no fire was reported before, during or after the power outage at the Superdome.

The New Orleans fire department was called to investigate a smell of gas near the Superdome's elevator No. 8, New Orleans police Sgt. T.J. St. Pierre said. The elevator was stalled on the seventh floor with people inside. The fire department tried to pry open the elevator from the basement, and it resumed operation after the power returned.

"At all times, Entergy's distribution and transmission feeders were serving the Mercedes-Benz Superdome," the company said. "We continue working with Superdome personnel to address any outstanding issues."

The NFL issued a brief statement during the game, saying the cause of the outage was being investigated. As postgame interviews of coaches and players were being held, NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said the league would not be making further comment.

Players stayed on the field during the outage. Some laid on the ground while others spent time stretching. After the initial shock of the outage wore off, fans started doing the wave. Once full lighting was restored, it appeared as if the Ravens still were resting.

"The problem was, we were talking it up on the sideline, like 'They're trying to take our momentum,' " Baltimore safety Ed Reed said. "And I was like, 'There are two teams on this field right here.' But once we started talking about it, it happened."

That set the stage for a dramatic finish under the brightest of lights. Kaepernick scrambled for a touchdown with 9:57 remaining, but the 49ers failed to convert a two-point conversion that would have tied the game.

Baltimore added a field goal with 4:19 remaining, but Kaepernick responded by orchestrating a drive that took the 49ers down the field with a chance to win the game. But San Francisco turned the ball over after Kaepernick threw three incomplete passes.

New Orleans was once a regular in the Super Bowl rotation and hopes to regain that status. Earlier in the week, the host committee announced it will bid on the 2018 Super Bowl, which would coincide with the 300th anniversary of the city's founding.

The 38-year-old Superdome has undergone $336 million in renovations since Katrina ripped its roof in 2005. Billions have been spent sprucing up downtown, the airport, French Quarter and other areas of the city in the past seven years.

Pleased with our summer savings, we decided to hold off on re-lighting the pilot light the next fall until we simply could no longer tolerate the cold in the condo. That day never came. So discovering just how wasteful the furnace pilot light was unlocked a path to energy reduction on a large scale. How we cope without heat (in San Diego, granted) is a story for another time.

This summer, I outfitted our hot water heater with thermochron iButtons to learn when the heater came on in order to get a sense for how much natural gas was being used to provide our hot water. I had one sensor on the cold water intake, one on the hot water output, and one on the flue chimney to sense when the unit fired up to heat a new batch of water.

Over a six day period, what I found was that the heater never fired up! This is despite normal (albeit light) use of hot water for showers, washing dishes, etc. The plot below shows the measurements.

From above, we see that my pilot light uses natural gas energy at a rate of 130 W. Over one day, this comes to about 11 MJ of energy. So we can easily accommodate our modest 5 MJ demand for hot water based on the steady expenditure from the pilot light. Of course there are losses due to heat escaping through the not-perfectly-insulated walls of the hot water tank and other paths. But we can use this investigation to conclude that such losses do not much exceed something like 50% given the 5 vs. 11 MJ matchup.

Normally, the hot water heater kicks on when the water temperature gets below the set-point. If the gas is never fired up, it means that our water never gets this cold. In fact, we find that our water is often too hot during summer. And it does no good if we turn down the thermostat: the pilot light conspires with the ambient temperature to determine the water temperature, and we have no way to turn the pilot light down.

So I would prefer a water heater with no pilot light (using electronic ignition like the seldom-used furnace in our new home), giving me control over the temperature set-point, and therefore how much gas we use. Or alternatively, a hot-on-demand system may similarly avoid wasted gas if it does not employ a pilot light. As it is, we are victims to our pilot light during the summer.

Another profitable activity is to monitor the dials when a gas-consumer is on: furnace, hot water, stove, oven, etc. Not only can you confirm or discover the usage rate (often visible on a label in Btu/hr, for instance), but once calibrated you can use simple timing to tally gas usage. For example, if you know that it takes 20 seconds for the cf dial to make a full turn when the furnace is on, and the furnace tends to stay on for 15 minutes at a time, then you know that each furnace cycle consumes 0.23 Therms, or about 7 kWh of energy.

That is a truly scary amount of energy being wasted. I wonder how many gas appliances in the US alone have similar wasteful pilot lights. I would imagine there would be tens of millions (or more) gas appliances with pilot lights. Anyone know a source for a concrete figure?

While per-capita U.S. power is 10 kW, the actual expenditure in households is far short of this. Most of the per-capita power consumption happens outside the home. And for me personally, the pilot lights at the condo consumed 70% of my gas during summer. Not trivial at all.

Modern gas furnaces are great. I also had a 95% efficient condensing model installed to replace the 30 year old one in my house. Cut my peak heating month energy usage from 70 therms to to 20 therms. And the house was more comfortable!

At least in California, with current record low gas prices, this is rarely economical with a therm of gas costing about $1.15 (4c / kWh equivalent) and electricity ranging from 14-30c / kWh depending on usage meaning that you need a COP of at least 3 to break even and potentially a lot more if heat pump usage puts you into top tiers paying 30c / kWh for electricity.

This particular one is a very North American problem, both the units and the pilot lights ?

Here in metric land (Germany in particular) we have government mandated efficiency and emission standards for hot water heaters and furnaces, so most of those 30+ year old things have disappeared a while ago. Aside from that most city dwellers here live in apartment buildings where they have no control over how the heating system is managed, and nobody uses braindead things like gas fireplaces.

On a related subject, one person mentioned bath and shower water. My wife and I have found that you can recycle at least some of the water by using a basin and a smallish garbage bin to catch and scoop water. We use it when flushing the toilet. Sorry if this seems like TMI, but I think that every little helps when it comes to resource efficiency.

I also agree that installing a simple solar thermal system is a good idea (especially in your climate). Consider using flat-plate collectors as opposed to evacuated tube type collectors. Flat plate collectors are not quite as efficient at colder exterior temperatures but this disadvantage will hardly be relevant in your climate. Also, flat plate collectors are VERY simple devices that can last for many years with very little maintenance. A friend of mine has been using the same flat plate collectors for over 25 years with almost no change in their performance.

Tom, I think I have to warn you against building your own water heating system:

This type of equipment can have non-intuitive and yet very deadly failure modes, so their design and construction is best left to specialised engineers and technicians.

Moreover, in most jurisdictions, any appliance connected with the natural gas supply, or with both the water supply and the mains, must be certified by appropriate authorities. Operating a home-made device, or a modified device, or even a certified device that was not installed by a licensed installer will be most likely illegal.

about heat exchangers below the drain: According to an architect friend of mine, this is indeed be the next big chunk of energy that would need to be recovered to get substantial savings. With new homes in Germany all being better than 10kWh/m^2/year for space heating, the energy going down the drain in hot water becomes disproportionately large.

The conversion between ccf and therm is not that straight forward. First, pressure and temperature compensations need to be made between to metering for better accuracy and not all meters have these capabilities. Second, the conversion varies depending on gas quality and can range from 0.990 up to 1.035. The quality depends on the source and the actual components of the gas as natural gas is not purely methane. The conversion factor varies significantly with every sampling result.

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