On 6/23/2023 11:15 PM, George Neuner wrote:
> On Tue, 20 Jun 2023 07:57:09 +0200, Terje Mathisen
> <terje.mathisen@tmsw.no> wrote:
>
>> Digging 400KV cables into the ground is about 3X more costly than
>> overhead power lines, but that does of course not translate into a 3X
>> cost for electricity, just for that specific part of the long distance
>> transmission. You could maybe add 3-10 cent/kWh?
>
> That's just simple installation ... in the US at least you would have
> to add in the costs of obtaining permission to dig: state, local, and
> maybe federal also depending on where. Then there would be endless
> lawsuits from environmentalists worried about ground squirrels (or
> whatever) being displaced by digging, and from neighbors (if there are
> any) concerned about how the digging would be disruptive to their
> lives, or how the buried lines might be dangerous to them.
>
> The higher the line voltage, the more opposition you would face. In
> many places local 10..20 KV lines do get buried [they are in my
> community], but people regularly see those same voltage wires on poles
> so they aren't terribly afraid of them. However, start talking about
> burying 100+KV lines that normally are strung on /towers/ protected by
> fences ... then people start to freak out.
>
> By the time you started digging, you would already have spent 10..15
> times the simple installation cost just getting permission to do it.
>
>
> And note that you would face exactly the same obstacles trying to put
> up a line of transmission towers - however the line of towers would be
> far less costly than digging a ditch of the same length. You can guess
> what happens.
>

Going back and forth to the my shop, I can see that many of the utility
poles have been replaced.

A lot of the old wooden poles broke off, so they dig a hole and put in a
new pole, in a few cases next to the stump of the old broken-off pole
(where they just sort of awkwardly tied the new pole onto what was left
of the old pole using steel straps).

Some of the places where they put in the new poles, they are not
particularly straight. So, new wooden poles, but installed leaning over
at weird angles.

Well, along with some amount of questionable looking wiring. Compared
with the "relatively orderly" way the lines are usually put up, there
are now cases where wires are run in ways that look somewhat more haphazard.

In a few places, there were rusty looking steel utility poles instead.
These ones seem to have pretty much survived.

Seems like they "could" have put in more steel or concrete poles, since
these appear to have been better able to survive getting blown over.

Also a lot of broken off branches strewn about, and some broken off trees.

On the street where my shop is, the power is back on, despite a few of
the utility poles being seriously leaned over and the power-lines are
basically laying on the ground (luckily the residential style
power-lines seem to have a sort of rubber sheath).

Not sure how well it would go if someone drove into the power-lines though.

In some cases, it looks like the base of the pole just sort of dislodged
itself from the ground and the whole pole just sorta fell over.

It all doesn't look particularly "elegant" at the moment...

Ironically, it was sort of a very different setup on Guam, where despite
many things being (at the ground level or in buildings) being a bit
questionable; the utility poles were basically all tall and imposing
pillars of solid concrete.

So, the power lines and utility poles were significantly taller than the
height of the trees, and typically like a 2 foot diameter. The cables
would run down the side of the pole, and then branch off to the houses.

Along one of the major roads, there was basically a series of very large
utility poles (~ 3 or 4 feet in diameter, also very tall). People would
periodically crash their cars into the poles, the cars would often end
up partly wrapped around the pole, but the poles were pretty much
entirely unaffected.

Though, typically whenever this happened, people would go and set up a
makeshift shrine on the pole, usually with flowers and pictures of
whoever passed on after crashing into the pole.

Well, also on Guam, the wind would also sometimes blow hard enough to
blow out ones' windows. The houses generally were made with solid
concrete walls and roofs (basically, like big concrete boxes), and
usually with steel doors and steel window shutters (and sealed concrete
slab floors). One would close the shutters during storms to hopefully
keep the wind from blowing out ones' windows (with wind speeds during
"typhoon season" sometimes high enough to flip and roll cars and
similar, ...).

Things like wood-frame housing "just wasn't a thing" there.
And the power would still usually survive a storm, ...

Then again, I think it was sort of the idea that most of the
construction practices there came from the US Military...

Also, house fires were less of an issue, since even if ones' stuff
caught fire, the house itself would remain intact (apart from maybe some
scorch marks; and fires would usually be confined to a single room, ...).

Though, radon buildup in houses was an issue (so, say, one would get a
radon pump installed, which pulls a vacuum in a pit dug under part of
the house's slab, and then vents it out through the roof).

But, yeah, in Tulsa, nearly every time it rains too hard or similar,
there is a blackout...

Also, wood-frame houses don't hold up particularly well to a tornado (or
high wind speeds in general), ...

>
>> Terje
>
> YMMV,
> George

George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> writes:
>On Tue, 20 Jun 2023 07:57:09 +0200, Terje Mathisen
><terje.mathisen@tmsw.no> wrote:
>
>>Digging 400KV cables into the ground is about 3X more costly than
>>overhead power lines, but that does of course not translate into a 3X
>>cost for electricity, just for that specific part of the long distance
>>transmission. You could maybe add 3-10 cent/kWh?
>
>That's just simple installation ... in the US at least you would have
>to add in the costs of obtaining permission to dig: state, local, and
>maybe federal also depending on where. Then there would be endless
>lawsuits from environmentalists worried about ground squirrels (or
>whatever) being displaced by digging, and from neighbors (if there are
>any) concerned about how the digging would be disruptive to their
>lives, or how the buried lines might be dangerous to them.

Hasn't stopped PG&E.

https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/customer-service/other-services/electric-undergrounding-program/electric-undergrounding-program.page

>
>The higher the line voltage, the more opposition you would face. In
>many places local 10..20 KV lines do get buried [they are in my
>community], but people regularly see those same voltage wires on poles
>so they aren't terribly afraid of them.

And these are the lines most likely to be a problem in
a storm or wildfire; think rural area distribution networks.

> However, start talking about
>burying 100+KV lines that normally are strung on /towers/ protected by
>fences ... then people start to freak out.

The towers for these are far more robust than the lodgepole pines used
for the 20kv distribution network and much more resiliant to natural
disaster or falling trees.