What's going on in California?

[Thomas]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

Richard,
It sure does look like money or rules merits when elections come about.

Helping somebody out or another country is fine w/ me,but they also have to show good intent and not keep there hand open all the times.

When Mr.Franklin was leaving the hall after signing the Bill of Rights,he was confronted and ask what kind of goverment do we have and his reply was "democratic one if you can keep it"
A late U.S.S.R. leader said to the USA "We will take you with out firing a shot"
I just hope this country not headed for another Boston Tea Party,but history does repeats its self.

What I can't really understand the goverment pays farmers not to farm,but we ship more food around the world and the food prices here are always going up,maybe some could explain that one better to me.

Its not just the goverment..heck the Ivy school where I work you talk about waste and politics...my word. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

Indeed there are still good people in office..on the streets..in the fields..living among the forest,what will it take to have there voices heard once again.

I guess this old fashion dumb @ss country farm boy becoming a dinosaur.
The said part is what lays ahead for next generations.

Thomas..NH /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

 

[cowboydoc]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

Well Tom I hope it's old fashioned dumb farmers that get around to running this country again someday!!! It was them that fought for it and made it what it is today.
Richard

 

[LazyK]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

Bird...It was me. I took this WebTv 'thing' down to Los Angeles when I was staying with my Dad; logged on with a local WebTV provided ISP. Coincidently with this minor TDY I.D. confusion, my Wife and Son
were configuring a PowerMac G-4 Cube system, my surprise late Christmas present. Sandee & Son set-up a new e-mail IP for me and tried(?) or succeeded(?) in registering my new address w/TBN and several other forums of which I'm a member.
Sorry for the 'undeliverable'-ness involving my e-mail address which I'm registered with here at TBN. I'll try to un-scramble my egg w/our esteemed
WebMaster after I get all the facts from my loving Wife and Son.
By-the-way, the threat of rolling black-outs were
rattling like 21st century sabers in L.A./SoCal
battle-grid areas. Good wake-up call for me while
staying at my Dad's house in west L.A. Broke out the 7.5Kw gen-set, made sure fresh fuel was stockpiled adequately/safely/easily-usably, strung the hook-up lead from gen-set to GenTrans, briefed
all concerned on how to follow my written "fire-up/lock and load" check list...basically, I brought the facility to DEFCON 3, condition 'yellow', less firearm access.('til I get back in 10 days) Until I get my Dad and his Caregiver up here to Lazy K, I'm going to stay down there full-time, except for this present 10-day absence.

I sense a tear in the fabric of serenity while visiting the Golden State of Dreams. Ghosts of Owens Valley may be restless for vengence on the Cadillac Desert.

Lazy K - Chip

 

[bpence]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

I have about 400 ft. of extension cord I'll donate to your cause. Maybe we can get enought folks across the country to pitch in and hook you up to some Michigan power.

What you're experinencing in California is a bit of a concern to those of us in Michigan. We're supposed to enter the power company de-regulation world pretty soon and the situation in California doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy about the de-regulation. For the most part we have ample power supply, but that's probably what everyone in California thought, too. Our two biggest power companies, Detroit Edison and Consumers Power, own a variety of power plants around the state. And even though I own stock in Detroit Edison, I'd sure hate to see them go profit crazy over selling electricity through a broker system.

Hope you get to keep the lights on. And if you can get more takers, my 400 ft. of power cord is available to start the hook up to get you some juice.

Bob Pence

 

[RobertN]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

We had a Nuke plant just outside of Sacramento. They shut it down by voter referendum in '89. Rancho Seco(often called "Rancho Mistako) had ~950MW capability. They did a news report on it a few days ago; people, including myself, have been asking why SMUD can't fire it back up. Well, in 11+ years, they've done a fair amount of dismantling. It would take a couple years to rebuild what has been removed.

Rancho Seco had a pretty poor history, from startup in the mid 70's till the shutdown. It usually never operated about 40% capacity. It was also very prone to breakdowns and shutdowns. As a kid, I never paid attention to it. So, I did some searching; thier performance was really marginal running the place. The anti-nukes were very harsh on the plant. So were the pro-nukes. The place just was not run well at all.

There is now a good chance to convert it to a natural gas fed plant. All the power disti systems and infrastructure are in place, left from when it was a operational nuke plant. It would be 2004 before they could finish the upgrade/retro, IF they can get gas to run it.

Sen Leslie is pushing Auburn Dam really hard right now. They started building it in the late 60's only to find they were building directly on top of fault lines. That , in addition to environmentalist pushing hard against it, put it in the tank. I used to be for the dam, but now I'd just as well they don't. It'll destroy the whole canyon, and will fall down in a earthquake.

RobertN in Shingle Springs Calif

 

[Harv]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

Bob -

Thanks for the 400-foot cord offer. I'll let you know when I need it for sure. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

We're still trying to figure out exactly what's going on. My latest research into the energy "crisis" yielded good news and bad news.

The good news is that my house is in outage block #50, which is the "exempt" block that includes hospitals 'n' such (may not need that cord after all).

The bad news is that the whole power company (PGE) may go bankrupt as early as today, so my exempt status may not mean diddly. Not really clear what happens to a public utility company when they go bankrupt. /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

Of course, I'm all sympathy for the company's president, who's annual salary is aroung $2.5 million. Probably has his own nuclear power plant in the basement /w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif.

Interesting times ...

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

We in the Northwest don't want to "give" California any more of "our" power.

I hear that now and then.

Of course we forget about the fact that the nations taxpayers paid for "our" dams decades ago and that California has been helping us in the winter as we normally help them in the summer!

This deregulation business is a California problem because they just happened to have the do-gooders sitting around looking for something that would justify their jobs. Or maybe they watched the same PBS program I did about deregulation (I think in MD VA?) that seems to have worked. They stressed however that it was done a teensy bit at a time over a LONG period, not just BANG it's done.

And that comment about the utility exec with a nuclear power plant in his basement. I caught another program about experimental home energy converters. I wouldn't know a neutron if I met one in my soup but it had something to do with running hydrogen in the air or water against a platinum sheet? For you tech heads I've probably really mangled this but it was putting out electricity quietly, as economically over a 10 year period as your power company. Currently the tecnology is $$$$ but I'm hopeful.

Hope it works, and hope it does in time for ME to use it!

 

[bpence]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

There's a guy down the road a ways that has his own highly efficient wind powered generator. He put it up several years ago and has some electricity storage capacity, but the interesting thing is the power company HAS to buy excess power he generates. This thing has huge blades that apparantly turn with any whisp of wind and the attached generator does its thing. All this to say, Harv, maybe you need to reconsider the suburban life style exit strategy to the weekend property as permanent residence and construct your own wind driven power source up there. If you can't take care of everyone else, at least take care of yourself.

Bob Pence

 

[Thomas]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

Bob,
If thats a heavy duty single phase cord you got,I have a Phoenix Drive and with a little of your juice the Phoenix Dive will put out three phase...triple your money also have couple of ABB Drive which is a power saver. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Thomas..NH /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

 

[RobertN]

Re: What\'s going on in California?

The local news did a report, the same evening as the one about our shut down nuke plant, about the wind turbine generators on Altamont Pass. On the beautiful sunny Ca. day last week, those generators were sitting idle, since they needed more wind. These sit in a very windy corridor.

RobertN in Shingle Springs Calif