Copley power situation

[Ken Cook]

Power continues to be off for some in this area, now into the 8th day of power cuts from storm Arwen. Copley was without electricity for 4 days. People have used the village hall at nearby Butterknowle for meals as it has a bottled-gas cooker and our street had an old generator. There remains a good community spirit in these parts.
We have a multi-fuel stove, burning anthracite, and this heats three radiators and gives warm water. It was a massive help, we have no mains gas here and the oil central heating needs electricity. Our solar panels also need electric to work! We shut part of the house off and that fell to 5C. A weak internet and mobile signal was available in one corner of one bedroom. Mobile phone was kept charged from our trusty little 4x4’s battery.
The few people who rely solely on electric had to move out. Most, though, have stoves and fires. I think an all-electric future does not appeal to people in these parts! Many who have not done so already are now going back to solid fuel and bottled gas for cooking as back-up after this episode.

It was another rough night last night with copious amounts of snow in the upper dale.

09Z ob Copley 05/12/2021

Copley MetO site 253m
NNW 20KT, 3 miles, overcast, rain&snow, 2C / 1C, 1009mb rising
09Z-09Z Max 3.2C min 0.1C grass -1.3C(under snow) rain 22.0mm(snow converted) sun yesterday 2.5hr snow depth 5cm fresh 5cm, down from 8cm midnight

Copley Lead Mill site 218m
Max 4.3C min 0.4C
Snow 4cm

Ken
Copley
nr Barnard Castle
Teesdale

[Keith (Southend)]

I can remember the power cuts in the 70's, back then we didn't have all
the other luxuries we plug into the mains. I never take for granted
these things and know how quickly I/we would struggle if the lights went
out. I only use electricity, not gas, but it does make you think.
Interesting you say you need electric for solar panels to work.

I can't start to imagine what it must be like, I for one feel the cold
very quickly.

Keith (Southend)

[Ken Cook]

Hi, Keith,
The nights are long and dark at this time of year. Head torch needs battery recharging regularly, torches are poor substitutes for electric lights!
I remember back into the early fifties, but we had gas lights and coal fires - we were not much affected by any power outages. We rely on it now a frightening amount. I hope these power cuts are not a sign of the future :-(
Ken

[Weather or Not]

Have you thought about having candles?

[Graham Easterling]

On Sunday, 5 December 2021 at 10:38:17 UTC, Keith (Southend)G wrote:

In the '70s power cut I was in London, on the same circuit as the local ambulance station, we never got cut off!

My solar panels also need electricity to work, but that needn't be the case of course, only if you are feeding into the grid to calm the feed in tariff. (My net electric bill over the year is negative). My neighbour has both on grid & off grid panels, and I had a wriend who lived in a caravan powered by panels off the Big Brother house! They also had a wind generator stuck in a Cornish hedge. They lived a perfectly normal off grid life.

Graham
Penzance

[Ken Cook]

Interesting, Graham, I'll look into that when my FIT stops. I get about £600 back atm, so it's basically free electric. I've also considered wind power. Not keen on air source heat pumps just yet, maybe later when they are improved. A friend in the village has one, but it needs boosting from his other heating system to keep his house reasonably warm during a Copley winter!
(Problem with me - I love my anthracite stove)
Ken

[John Hall]

In message <7288ea92-a57c-4c32...@googlegroups.com>, Ken
Cook <cople...@gmail.com> writes

>Power continues to be off for some in this area, now into the 8th day
>of power cuts from storm Arwen. Copley was without electricity for 4
>days. People have used the village hall at nearby Butterknowle for
>meals as it has a bottled-gas cooker and our street had an old
>generator. There remains a good community spirit in these parts.
>We have a multi-fuel stove, burning anthracite, and this heats three
>radiators and gives warm water. It was a massive help, we have no mains
>gas here and the oil central heating needs electricity. Our solar
>panels also need electric to work! We shut part of the house off and
>that fell to 5C. A weak internet and mobile signal was available in one
>corner of one bedroom. Mobile phone was kept charged from our trusty
>little 4x4’s battery.
>The few people who rely solely on electric had to move out. Most,
>though, have stoves and fires. I think an all-electric future does not
>appeal to people in these parts! Many who have not done so already are
>now going back to solid fuel and bottled gas for cooking as back-up
>after this episode.
>
>It was another rough night last night with copious amounts of snow in
>the upper dale.

<snip>

I'm amazed that it's taking so long to get everyone reconnected. I don't
remember it ever taking so long in the past. Perhaps the amount of snow
has made access to some remote breakages difficult?
--
John Hall
"Home is heaven and orgies are vile,
But you *need* an orgy, once in a while."
Ogden Nash (1902-1971)

[Graham Easterling]

I do like some sort of real fire as well - it just adds something!

Basically what you need is something like this, an AC inverter / battery pack.
https://callidus.shop/collections/off-grid-equipment-for-buildings/products/easysolar-24-1600-40-16-230v-mppt-100-50. The cost excludes panels 7 battery pack, so it's not cheap.

You can then connect panels to it, and somehow connect the output to your home (I'm not an electrician!) In long periods without sun you can charge the batteries from the mains to keep them topped up.
I think it's an interesting option for people in remote spots prone to power cuts where they are bottom of list when it comes to being reconnected.

Graham

[Ken Cook]

Hi, John,
I think you are correct about the snow for access, there are some very remote locations to service. The snow's weight, wet snow that then froze, also brought cables down - one fell across the road outside our house, it is still only temporarily repaired. Also the wind direction was northerly. Our usual gales come from the Pennine Lee Wave on a WSW'ly and trees that are normally sheltered took the full force and fell onto the cables. However, the highest wind gust in the dale was 86mph on Great Dun Fell, not really remarkable for that site. It has to be something else that caused the problems.
I know of reports from the public of leaning, weak electricity poles that have been ignored in the past, together with close-by trees reported that were likely to fall also ignored. So is poor maintenance by Northern powergrid an issue? The lack of communication from them and false promises of re-connection were poor.
The number of lines down was amazing and the electricity repair workers, local communities and army have been outstanding.
I hope other areas do not suffer from what could turn out to be poor maintenance, or cuts like these could be a thing of the future.
Ken

[Martin Brown]

On 05/12/2021 10:07, Ken Cook wrote:

> Power continues to be off for some in this area, now into the 8th day
> of power cuts from storm Arwen. Copley was without electricity for 4
> days. People have used the village hall at nearby Butterknowle for
> meals as it has a bottled-gas cooker and our street had an old
> generator. There remains a good community spirit in these parts. We
> have a multi-fuel stove, burning anthracite, and this heats three
> radiators and gives warm water. It was a massive help, we have no
> mains gas here and the oil central heating needs electricity. Our
> solar panels also need electric to work! We shut part of the house
> off and that fell to 5C. A weak internet and mobile signal was
> available in one corner of one bedroom. Mobile phone was kept charged
> from our trusty little 4x4’s battery. The few people who rely solely
> on electric had to move out. Most, though, have stoves and fires. I
> think an all-electric future does not appeal to people in these
> parts! Many who have not done so already are now going back to solid
> fuel and bottled gas for cooking as back-up after this episode.

Glad to hear you are OK.

Be sure to keep any smartphones well charged - you can't afford to let
them become fully discharged. My wife's iPhone X refused point blank to
accept charge from the in car USB socket after it had run out of charge
completely on the first day. I'm surprised your mobile network masts
still have battery power remaining after so long - but perhaps you have
line of sight on more distant ones that are outside the no power zone.

I have my suspicions from what happened round here that someone hasn't
been checking and replacing rotten poles to save money. It has been a
while since there was a decent winter gale. We had a lot of trees down
in the Northallerton area, North Yorkshire but most that blocked roads
were sliced and diced by the farmers on the Saturday morning.

Thank heavens for solid fuel stoves, candles and spirit burners. We were
fairly well prepared. We don't have gas mains or otherwise. A camping
stove is on my Xmas list as is a generator.

Thankfully I still have a POTS line (very nearly didn't since now FTTP).

Northern Powergrid demonstrated a woeful inadequacy at providing timely
accurate information to both their customers and engineers. Heads should
roll for this. They care way more about their shareholders than they do
about their customers.

>
> It was another rough night last night with copious amounts of snow in
> the upper dale.
>
> 09Z ob Copley 05/12/2021
>
> Copley MetO site 253m NNW 20KT, 3 miles, overcast, rain&snow, 2C /
> 1C, 1009mb rising 09Z-09Z Max 3.2C min 0.1C grass -1.3C(under snow)
> rain 22.0mm(snow converted) sun yesterday 2.5hr snow depth 5cm fresh
> 5cm, down from 8cm midnight
>
> Copley Lead Mill site 218m Max 4.3C min 0.4C Snow 4cm
>
> Ken Copley nr Barnard Castle Teesdale

Looks from the Yellow weather warning for wind and snow that Tuesday
could be a bit tough if they haven't managed to fix it by then.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/warnings/weather

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

[Ken Cook]

Hi, Martin,
Yes, it is looking more and more like a maintenance problem. Let's see what storm Barra brings to other areas.
Ken