Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Background to the Blackout- A compendium of IEEE Spectrum material

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sun, 24 Aug 2003 04:06:18 -0400

Background to the Blackout- A compendium of IEEE Spectrum material

Power engineers, IEEE members, and the Spectrum reporters and editors who cover
power and energy have been sounding the alarm about grid problems and potential
cascading failures for nearly a decade. What follows is a compendium of feature
articles, news reports, and essays that have appeared in IEEE Spectrum magazine
about previous power outages, grid reliability and security, and electric power
policy.

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/special/aug03/comp.html

2002 Department of Energy grid study

An expert team organized by the U.S. Department of Energy prepared to release its
National Transmission Grid Study at a time when other authorities were sounding
alarms about the state of the transmission system.

See "Energy Team Readies Major Transmission Study," by Barbara Klein and William
Sweet:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/feb02/ntran.html

2001 Cheney task force on energy policy

The controversial study headed by U.S. Vice President Richard B. Cheney squarely
recognized a crisis in the electricity sector but took a rather one-dimensional
view of the problem. Better ways of operating transmission systems, recommended by
the policy arm of IEEE, got short shrift in the report. The study paid lip
service, but not very forcefully, to strengthening the nation’s self-managing
reliability organization by giving it greater enforcement powers.

See "Energy Woes," by William Sweet and Elizabeth A. Bretz:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jul01/ewoe.html

Three views on deregulation of the U.S. electric industry

The U.K. model on which U.S. electric industry deregulation was based is, after 10
years, a failure. In addition to the essay explaining Britain’s deregulation woes,
two other views on the problems inherent in the deregulation of electric energy
are presented.

See "Technology Offers Solutions to the Current Power Crisis" by Karl Stahlkopf,
"Electricity Restructuring in Britain: Not a Model to Follow" by Theo MacGregor,
and "Putting Consumers First" by Glenn English:

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/jun01/spea.html

Seeing at a glance what's up with the grid

While the electric power system was designed as the ultimate in plug-and-play
convenience, the humble wall outlet has become a gateway to one of the largest and
most complex of man-made objects. Basically the grid in most of North America is
just one big electric circuit encompassing billions of components, tens of
millions of kilometers of transmission line, and thousands of generators. More
than ever, it's essential for power traders, grid managers, public service boards,
and the public itself to be able to see and imagine what's going on.

See "Visualizing the Electric Grid," by Thomas J. Overbye and James D. Weber:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/feb01/egrid.html

2000 post-outage study team (POST)

Following widespread power outages in the summer of 1999, from New York City and
New England to Chicago and Texas, the U.S. Department of Energy convened an expert
panel to diagnose the situation. A picture emerged in that panel’s hearings of a
power system that was already being stretched to its limits. Whether the talk was
of generation and transmission capacity, distribution lines or control equipment,
service personnel or simulation engineers, it was the same story: too few
resources to easily satisfy demands made on systems designed for radically
different requirements.

See "Restructuring the Thin-Stretched Grid," by William Sweet:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun00/grdo.html

An outstanding grid regulating organization

Even at a time when the electric power system was stretched to its limits, and
there had yet to be any serious test of the newly created "independent system
operators" established to manage deregulated grid systems, one such organization
stood out as exceptionally competent and effective. This was the Pennsylvania-New
Jersey-Maryland ISO, or, formally, the PJM Interconnection—an organization that
proved its mettle once again on 14 August, when it largely preventing the
cascading outage that began in Ohio from infecting its control area.

See "PJM Interconnection: Model of a Smooth Operator," by Elizabeth A. Bretz:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun00/grdp.html

Could hackers be the next big threat?

When the northeastern grid went down on 14 August, suspicions immediately centered
on the possibility of terrorism. That fear was almost certainly unfounded, but
this does not mean that such threats are non-existent. The nation’s electric power
systems are more dependent all the time on communications, and those
communications offer ill-willed hackers tempting targets.

See "The Next Threat to Grid Reliability—Data Security," by David A. Jones and
Ronald L.
Skelton:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/spea.html

Lessons from the 1996 California outages

The inglorious summer of 1996 blackouts taught the West to improve emergency
control and protection and to sharpen simulation techniques. Though California
would experience another huge electricity crisis in 2001–2002, that one was
largely induced by a faulty system of deregulation that bankrupted the state’s
utilities. The state’s independent system operator, working frantically, largely
kept the lights on.

See "Improving Grid Behavior," by Carson W. Taylor:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/grid.html

Challenges to grid reliability from deregulation

Even as the lessons of California were being absorbed, it was evident that the
process of separating electricity generation from transmission was sowing
uncertainty as to who was responsible for making new investments—or even
identifying new investment needs. And experts predicted that maintain reliable
grids in a deregulated power industry would get harder, as temptations to cut
corners multiplied.

See "Keeping the Lights On," by John D. Mountford and Ricardo R. Austria:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/jun99/pow.html

The promise of new technology

The promise of new technologies offering much closer management of electricity
flows is still largely unrealized. One such technology, known as flexible ac
transmission systems or FACTS, relies on large-scale semiconductor devices.
Another technology, pioneered in the western grid system, allows power system
dynamics to be monitored in real time. It depends on digital communications and
GPS-based time-keeping. Yet even in 1997, the buildout and effective use of such
system was hampered by inadequate financing and manpower, Spectrum learned from
experts like former U.S. energy secretary Hazel O’Leary.

See "Tighter Controls for Busier Systems," by Karl E. Stahlkopf and Mark R.
Wilhelm:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/apr97/inte.html

Lessons from abroad?

In the wake of the 14 August disturbance, former U.S. energy secretary Bill
Richardson compared the U.S. electricity system to those of Third World countries.
That may have been insulting to less advanced economies. In 1997, two emigré
engineers from Russia argued that the United States had much to learn from
practices developed in the former Soviet Union. However that may be, it’s evident
that there are poor countries with much more reliable grids, and few if any rich
countries with grids that experience as frequent and serious problems.

See "Heading Off Emergencies in Large Electric Grids," by Nickolai Grudinin and
Ilya Roytelman:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/apr97/reli.html

Brainpower outage preceded blackout

The electric power industry in the United States is facing a serious and
potentially dangerous shortage of people with the know-how necessary to maintain
the grid. Badrul Chowdhury, a professor in the electrical and computer engineering
department of the University of Missouri-Rolla, notes that for decades, salaries
paid power engineers have been lower than for virtually all other electrical
engineers. Consequently, student enrollments have steadily declined, and
university programs have atrophied. In addition, as the electric power industry
has reorganized to allow for greater competition, utilities have cut staff. These
cuts occurred even as the technical requirements of running the grid have become
spectacularly more demanding.
See "Power Education at the Crossroads," by Badrul Chowdhury:

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/oct00/pow.html

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