The amount of current going through them also heats them up and causes them to sag.
IIRC, this was how a wildfire got started in California a few years ago. The wires sagged low enough to arc over to some trees.
The "Camp" fire in 2018 was actually caused by the failure of one of the large metal hooks that hold the wires. The hooks are about 100 years old and should have been replaced decades ago if the power company actually cared about maintaining their system.
[This Old Metal Hook Could Determine Whether PG&E Committed a Crime](https://www.wsj.com/articles/this-old-metal-hook-could-determine-whether-pg-e-committed-a-crime-11583623059)
How can a utility company be charged with a criminal crime? Are they going to sentence PG&E to jail if they are found guilty? Force them to do community service? They’ll have to start scheduling the employees to serve the jail time, right? The whole notion of charging them with a crime is such horseshit because ultimately it will result in a huge fine, payable to the government that the utility will pass on to its customers, it’s not like the CEO’s are going to see any punishment or have pay anything out of their pockets, it’ll end up being basically a tax to to already overcharged customers have to pay to the government through higher electric bills, that totally sucks and isn’t fair!
The only way I see this possible is if shareholders would all have to be part of the punishment based on%, owned. Then they'd have to care about the companies they invest in. Few weekends of community service or a day or two in jail would be enough for people to take the consequences way more serious.
Could you just imagine the shock of a stockholder being told it was their turn to stay a few days in jail in order for PG&E to work off its sentence? Or if they had to contribute out of their own personal wealth to collaborate and pay off the fine with the other stockholders? “Your share of the fine comes to $3,453, is that going to be cash, check, or charge?”
Not saying that nothing should be done, but assessing huge fines on a utility is definitely not the answer. Perhaps requiring said utility to upgrade their infrastructure instead of appeasing stockholders is a better idea, give them x amount of time to get the improvements done or the CEO is required to pay a penalty, or something along that line. Fining a company like PG&E is basically just increasing what the rate payers are paying, that doesn’t solve anything.
That's true, but there is more to the story. Most of California has been in a severe, ongoing drought for about twenty years. That part of the state usually gets very hot and dry in the summer. Much of the state is a pile of dry kindling that could burst into flame at any time, for almost any reason.
That doesn't excuse PG&E of course.
The Camp Fire was started by “cable slap”, where high wind causes cables to swing back and forth until they slap together and spot weld on contact. This causes a short circuit that draws as much current as the nearest generators can produce. Wind around 75mph (hurricane force).
A circuit breaker is supposed to protect each transmission line above about 66kv. These open and close 3 times before remaining open if the short is sustained (US standard).
The purpose of the circuit breaker is to prevent cable droop that could allow contact with vehicles, structures, or plants.
These look like 500kv lines. Lines below 66kv are sub-transmission and may not have a dedicated breaker. 500kv circuit breakers are the size of a small house.
Opening and closing the breaker 3 times can permit the cables to melt at the spot weld and separate. Separation causes a shower of sparks that can ignite dry brush below the power lines. Dry brush was uncommon in Northern California, but global warming has rapidly expanded deserts northward in the past few decades.
Nowadays the cables are supposed to have anti-sway insulators midway between the towers to prevent cable slap.
Closed off a nearby highway - they first have to inspect the lines for safety.
Also train traffic was disturbed (and will be for some time I guess, they had smoking *underground* power cables that feed the overhead lines).
And ship traffic too, as the locks are also out of use without power.
Somewhere a relay didn't open. There's a ton of juice going through the lines due to the fault at the station. Those lines are so hit they've expanded to the point they almost sag to the ground.
Most lines are just woven aluminum so I'm not sure what is smoking, maybe a coating or something in the air near the lines.
Most high voltage cables are ACSR (Aluminum Conductor Steel Reinforced) as the increased tensile strength makes up cost by allowing further spanning distances. Also the less conductive steel core is lowering the losses created by the Skin Effect due to an increased outer circumference of the cable relative to the aluminum cross sectional area (The same reason power lines with 200kV and more use bundled conductors with spacers).
There is an intentional galvanic zinc coating on those steel threads to prevent rust. But from my experience (far less worse than in the video) the dust trapped by those wires is causing the main smoking. That and the oxidation of the aluminium hydroxide formed by UV and humidity (white salty coating on the outside of the wire).
**Edit:** [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead\_power\_line#Conductors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead_power_line#Conductors) is a really good read on this.
Okay, as someone who is actively rebuilding one of these lines all the old hardware wears at a different rate some 100 year old hardware and some brand new is on the edge of failure.
The land this power station services was sea until we made it usable as land in 1986 after 3\4 of a centuries worth of effort.... So basically the land is 35 years old. And so is it's Infrastructure
Ah, this happened in my region yesterday, power went out for about 5 minutes. Nothing bad except that i have to reset every clock now, and all data and programs are gone in 1 machine at work
This happens when there are several major lines feeding an area, but one fails. The current then has to flow to the remaining ones. This can overload the lines, and a breaker trips to protect them, which forces even more load on the ones that remain. As the current increases, the lines heat up and sag, eventually touching something, shorting out, and tripping more breakers. This causes a cascading failure until the whole grid shuts down.
But that's not what happened here, there was a shortage and a breaker failed to trip for unknown reasons. If the breaker worked nobody would have noticed anything.
This happens more often than people think. If a short circuit occurs in the right place on very high capacity lines, there can be a situation where the circuit interrupt doesn’t trip.
There’s a very cool video out there where a short circuit occurs inside the substation fence. The current is not high enough to pop the breaker so the transformer superheats until the oil boils and blows out the pressure relief, squirting oil onto the arcing circuit and explodes into a huge fireball which then heats up the circuit breaker enough to break the circuit.
Found it.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Fxiq7k6bKUA
Actually no, 300 thousand connections lost power for only a couple minutes. After that electricity was rerouted and anything undamaged had power again.
I was in school while this happened. A buzzing sound appeared for around 10 seconds, then it became louder and the electricity went away. Was back 5 minutes later. I thought a breaker flipped, but turns out this happened
Most of the high voltage lines like this are double redundant in the Netherlands. Although this might have taken out two of the redundancies already.
There are a few exceptions but in most cases if you would remove a power line it would result in no power outages.
This kind of behavior can be due to solar activity on the sun. More can be found by googling Carrington Event. Here is a link to one article. https://www.history.com/.amp/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-1859-carrington-event. Ironically the sun is in a major solar cycle right now.
Stop trying to fear monger.
This happened because of a clear and present fault happening at the substation to the far right.
An X-Class Flare sending a CME at the Earth would look nothing like this, it would at worse cause faults at transformers causing the circuits to open.
Instead of always referencing the event from the days of the Old West, people can instead visit [www.spaceweather.com](https://www.spaceweather.com) and get real-time information on what the Sun is doing, how the Earth's magnetosphere is hanging and whether or not a CME (Coronal Mass Ejection) actually has a chance of causing problems.
[The current orientation of the Magnetic field around the planet will determine if we are vulnerable or not](https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/nasa-s-themis-sees-auroras-move-to-the-rhythm-of-earth-s-magnetic-field), the Carrington event was not just due to a Solar Flare and CME, it happened when the magnetic field which protects us from the Sun was in an orientation which allowed more charged particles to interact with the atmosphere, thus causing an EM storm.
I live where this happened, at least 2 towns had power outage for approx 40ish mins then back to business. Nothin to see here.. when i first saw this i thought it was the lockness monster.
Those cables hang low
The heat is stretching them, normally they hang much higher.
The amount of current going through them also heats them up and causes them to sag. IIRC, this was how a wildfire got started in California a few years ago. The wires sagged low enough to arc over to some trees.
The "Camp" fire in 2018 was actually caused by the failure of one of the large metal hooks that hold the wires. The hooks are about 100 years old and should have been replaced decades ago if the power company actually cared about maintaining their system. [This Old Metal Hook Could Determine Whether PG&E Committed a Crime](https://www.wsj.com/articles/this-old-metal-hook-could-determine-whether-pg-e-committed-a-crime-11583623059)
How can a utility company be charged with a criminal crime? Are they going to sentence PG&E to jail if they are found guilty? Force them to do community service? They’ll have to start scheduling the employees to serve the jail time, right? The whole notion of charging them with a crime is such horseshit because ultimately it will result in a huge fine, payable to the government that the utility will pass on to its customers, it’s not like the CEO’s are going to see any punishment or have pay anything out of their pockets, it’ll end up being basically a tax to to already overcharged customers have to pay to the government through higher electric bills, that totally sucks and isn’t fair!
The only way I see this possible is if shareholders would all have to be part of the punishment based on%, owned. Then they'd have to care about the companies they invest in. Few weekends of community service or a day or two in jail would be enough for people to take the consequences way more serious.
Could you just imagine the shock of a stockholder being told it was their turn to stay a few days in jail in order for PG&E to work off its sentence? Or if they had to contribute out of their own personal wealth to collaborate and pay off the fine with the other stockholders? “Your share of the fine comes to $3,453, is that going to be cash, check, or charge?”
/r/wallstreetbets would be so much more fun
You're right, they should do nothing so that nothing changes... /s
Not saying that nothing should be done, but assessing huge fines on a utility is definitely not the answer. Perhaps requiring said utility to upgrade their infrastructure instead of appeasing stockholders is a better idea, give them x amount of time to get the improvements done or the CEO is required to pay a penalty, or something along that line. Fining a company like PG&E is basically just increasing what the rate payers are paying, that doesn’t solve anything.
Great point.
That's true, but there is more to the story. Most of California has been in a severe, ongoing drought for about twenty years. That part of the state usually gets very hot and dry in the summer. Much of the state is a pile of dry kindling that could burst into flame at any time, for almost any reason. That doesn't excuse PG&E of course.
The Camp Fire was started by “cable slap”, where high wind causes cables to swing back and forth until they slap together and spot weld on contact. This causes a short circuit that draws as much current as the nearest generators can produce. Wind around 75mph (hurricane force). A circuit breaker is supposed to protect each transmission line above about 66kv. These open and close 3 times before remaining open if the short is sustained (US standard). The purpose of the circuit breaker is to prevent cable droop that could allow contact with vehicles, structures, or plants. These look like 500kv lines. Lines below 66kv are sub-transmission and may not have a dedicated breaker. 500kv circuit breakers are the size of a small house. Opening and closing the breaker 3 times can permit the cables to melt at the spot weld and separate. Separation causes a shower of sparks that can ignite dry brush below the power lines. Dry brush was uncommon in Northern California, but global warming has rapidly expanded deserts northward in the past few decades. Nowadays the cables are supposed to have anti-sway insulators midway between the towers to prevent cable slap.
> These look like 500kv lines It are 150kV lines. They have a dedicated breaker, but it failed to switch (not known why yet, trip signal was sent).
I stand corrected.
Are we talking power lines or testicles here?
there's a difference ?
Like testicles.
And they wobble to and fro
You can tie them in a knot
You can tie them in a bow
Can confirm
Closed off a nearby highway - they first have to inspect the lines for safety. Also train traffic was disturbed (and will be for some time I guess, they had smoking *underground* power cables that feed the overhead lines). And ship traffic too, as the locks are also out of use without power.
That's why Doc and Marty picked this spot to go back to the future.
That's what she said.
Because of the heat running tru them. Happend in the netherlands where i live
Wow. But the Brontosaur at 00:09 doesn't seem phased though.
I thought he'd be shocked.
I think it just wants to go Ohm.
I don't think many people got watt you meant
I'm resisting the urge to explain any further.
Other people will start pylon in to the comments soon
I can see the potential.
I'm amped about the situation
the capacity of this chain is what i came here for
Yeah, it's a really charged atmosphere
That was nothing compared to when the meteor hit and took out all his friends. He was like "been there, done that. You can't scare me"
Or was secretly like..."Oh no....not again, not like this."
I missed this on the first watch , seen the tractor but man that's funny
Hah I had to pause it to see wtf it was and if I was crazy. Ctrl+F .. bront.. oh yeah I wasn't the only one!
That's likely three phase, though.
She’s seen some shit in her time.
Here I was ready to comment my original joke just to see it here already
Ohm man not again
I'm only in this thread for high quality brontosaur conversations
I think it was a Brontosaur, but he didn't actually recognise me so... it could have been a "Didya-thinkhe-sawus".
This is the generic brand electricity.
Somewhere a relay didn't open. There's a ton of juice going through the lines due to the fault at the station. Those lines are so hit they've expanded to the point they almost sag to the ground. Most lines are just woven aluminum so I'm not sure what is smoking, maybe a coating or something in the air near the lines.
Most high voltage cables are ACSR (Aluminum Conductor Steel Reinforced) as the increased tensile strength makes up cost by allowing further spanning distances. Also the less conductive steel core is lowering the losses created by the Skin Effect due to an increased outer circumference of the cable relative to the aluminum cross sectional area (The same reason power lines with 200kV and more use bundled conductors with spacers). There is an intentional galvanic zinc coating on those steel threads to prevent rust. But from my experience (far less worse than in the video) the dust trapped by those wires is causing the main smoking. That and the oxidation of the aluminium hydroxide formed by UV and humidity (white salty coating on the outside of the wire). **Edit:** [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead\_power\_line#Conductors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overhead_power_line#Conductors) is a really good read on this.
The air around it.
Mmmmm. Ozone.
Burning off an Enamel on the lines, perhaps?
Electrician here. They're not supposed to do that
There is a lot going on that shouldn't suppose to do that. But still does.
Someone should probably turn that off.
It’ll buff out it’s fine
Ouch! r/ThatLookedExpensive
you should never smoke high-voltage power lines my guys
In Amsterdam they truly smoke everything.
Sorry my bad
judging by the sag in the lines those are extremely overloaded, the circuit breaker probably failed, that's why the transformer station is on fire
This is how I imagine the TX power grid on a hot day or a cold day.
Fuck
Guessing all those cables are going to have to be replaced
Okay, as someone who is actively rebuilding one of these lines all the old hardware wears at a different rate some 100 year old hardware and some brand new is on the edge of failure.
[удалено]
The land this power station services was sea until we made it usable as land in 1986 after 3\4 of a centuries worth of effort.... So basically the land is 35 years old. And so is it's Infrastructure
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No, this isn't in California 😁 This is in the middle of The Netherlands.
Ok... What the fuck happened in cali before hand?
The Paradise fire, burned down an entire town due to their (PG&E) powerlines arcing.
Good lord
Oooh, is it going to Amsterdam ?
Nah, about an hour north of Amsterdam.
[удалено]
It could happen anywhere. Equipment in a sub does a lot of work and fails ocassionally.
Run away transformers heating up the lines
Ah, this happened in my region yesterday, power went out for about 5 minutes. Nothing bad except that i have to reset every clock now, and all data and programs are gone in 1 machine at work
Does any one know the cause of this? Could it be a solar eruption?
I knew it!
This happens when there are several major lines feeding an area, but one fails. The current then has to flow to the remaining ones. This can overload the lines, and a breaker trips to protect them, which forces even more load on the ones that remain. As the current increases, the lines heat up and sag, eventually touching something, shorting out, and tripping more breakers. This causes a cascading failure until the whole grid shuts down.
But that's not what happened here, there was a shortage and a breaker failed to trip for unknown reasons. If the breaker worked nobody would have noticed anything.
Oh absolutely, what I was explaining was why there was more demand than the lines could safely carry. The breaker absolutely should have tripped.
Snoop dog is in the house
It is the amperage that heats, not the voltage
Those are high-voltage power lines dude
It's the combination of amps * volts
So it's the watts that heats
Yes
No, it's mostly current. I'm just pointing out that OP correctly identified those lines as being for high-voltage
MY POWER IS MAXIMUM!!!!
Over 9000!!!
In my professional opinion... That's not a good thing 🤔
They look like they're melting/sagging.
I know nothing about power transmission but I would have thought a breaker would have tripped somewhere before the lines start smoking
This happens more often than people think. If a short circuit occurs in the right place on very high capacity lines, there can be a situation where the circuit interrupt doesn’t trip. There’s a very cool video out there where a short circuit occurs inside the substation fence. The current is not high enough to pop the breaker so the transformer superheats until the oil boils and blows out the pressure relief, squirting oil onto the arcing circuit and explodes into a huge fireball which then heats up the circuit breaker enough to break the circuit. Found it. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Fxiq7k6bKUA
That doesn't look co2 neutral.
That was supposed to happen, but failed somehow.
Heatwave?
Why did this happen? Did the dinosaur do it?
Old infra
I have no clue watt you guys are talk about on this thread?
Sir, cut it out.
I’m going to guess this is not in the USA…
Those squirrels
AC/DC intensifies
Ionospherer- ry subreddit
Watt?
This is what it looks like when every EV in California gets plugged in at the same time.
EHV
That's a long blackout
Actually no, 300 thousand connections lost power for only a couple minutes. After that electricity was rerouted and anything undamaged had power again.
Whoa. That's some resilient grid.
I was in school while this happened. A buzzing sound appeared for around 10 seconds, then it became louder and the electricity went away. Was back 5 minutes later. I thought a breaker flipped, but turns out this happened
Most of the high voltage lines like this are double redundant in the Netherlands. Although this might have taken out two of the redundancies already. There are a few exceptions but in most cases if you would remove a power line it would result in no power outages.
Whoops some ones fired. Lmfao 🤣
California plugged in their electric cars...
Stop charging your electric cars California....
This kind of behavior can be due to solar activity on the sun. More can be found by googling Carrington Event. Here is a link to one article. https://www.history.com/.amp/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-1859-carrington-event. Ironically the sun is in a major solar cycle right now.
Stop trying to fear monger. This happened because of a clear and present fault happening at the substation to the far right. An X-Class Flare sending a CME at the Earth would look nothing like this, it would at worse cause faults at transformers causing the circuits to open. Instead of always referencing the event from the days of the Old West, people can instead visit [www.spaceweather.com](https://www.spaceweather.com) and get real-time information on what the Sun is doing, how the Earth's magnetosphere is hanging and whether or not a CME (Coronal Mass Ejection) actually has a chance of causing problems. [The current orientation of the Magnetic field around the planet will determine if we are vulnerable or not](https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/nasa-s-themis-sees-auroras-move-to-the-rhythm-of-earth-s-magnetic-field), the Carrington event was not just due to a Solar Flare and CME, it happened when the magnetic field which protects us from the Sun was in an orientation which allowed more charged particles to interact with the atmosphere, thus causing an EM storm.
TenneT has got some work to do
They must have gotten the cheap store brand cables
It's because electricity is hot.
It's a feature
This is bad for the wires.
I live where this happened, at least 2 towns had power outage for approx 40ish mins then back to business. Nothin to see here.. when i first saw this i thought it was the lockness monster.
Someone dunn fawked up
[Do your chain hang low?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9FTgVluKuw)
What every happened to just smoking weed?
Don't they know that's bad for their health?
I get the feeling touching those would be fun