Category: Electrical Engineering Helps Humanity

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TVA Is Better Prepared by Running Their Natural Gas Units During This Artic Blast!

TVA-Artic-Blast-2024

Chattanooga Times Free Press – Since the year end of 2022, Winter Storm Elliott buckled TVA’s Power Grid forcing them to cycle temporary power blackouts across the Tennessee Valley Region. The region has not seen rolling blackouts by TVA since “its 90-year history.” After experiencing these power shortages, TVA has had over a year to prepare for another frigid winter artic blast like the one that is challenging the region now by average temperatures dropping as low as the teens and the wind chill into the single digits.

TVA is better prepared this winter with recent generation upgrades and improvement projects, including running several natural gas units as peak shavers during this artic blast.
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Bosch Thermostats Vulnerable to Cyber Attacks!

Bosch-Thermostat-Cyber-Threats

From FoxNews – Smart thermostats have increased over the last decade as a residential internet of things (IoT) device with Wi-Fi enabled connectivity to home networks. Many home IoT devices have been exposed to cyber threats and vulnerabilities where the Bosch thermostats are the latest to be affected. This issue affected the Bosch thermostats “could allow hackers to access and manipulate the thermostat’s settings or even install malicious software.”

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EV’s Not Able to Charge During Frigid Temperatures!

Tesla-charge-problems
NPR News-Nam Y. Huh/AP

From NPR News – Due to the arctic blast and frigid temperatures well below zero degrees, many electric vehicles (EV’s) were sadly affected. Since the frigid temperatures in the northern part of the U.S. reached levels below the EV’s normal operating temperature ranges for their batteries, the vehicles could not be re-charged or maintain a constant charge. This presented major obstacles for many Tesla owners in Chicago along with longer than expected lines for Supercharger stations.

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Power Regulators Warning Power Grids Vulnerable This Winter

Winter-Power-Outages
Photo by Insaug.com

A recent NPR article warns that much of the nation’s power grid is vulnerable to the winter threat approaching with major winter storms that could cause power outages and power shortages potentially affecting over 60% of US and Canada.

“North America’s power grid is vulnerable…People living in Southwestern states are at particular risk.”

(Continue Reading at NPR.org…)

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Pennsylvania Is Moving from Coal Power to Renewables

New-Solar-Power

As coal power and other fossil fuels continue to decline as the nation’s leading power generation source, more power utilities are increasing renewable energy sources such as solar power.

Pennsylvania is replacing their planned fossil fuel generation retirements with clean solar power. The state is helping promote more jobs and job transitions for the green switch from traditional carbon emission type power generation into renewable energy resources.

(Continue Reading at Powermag.com…)