Thread by @MichaelEWebber

Winter Storm Uri 5+ weeks ago knocked out power, heat & water to millions of Texans, including me.

I installed several technologies at home to make it resilient. I thought you be interested to hear how they performed through the energy crisis. [THREAD]

Image: @weatherchannel

B/c of the 2011 TX freeze that knocked out power I installed several solutions to make my house robust against shortages:

1) super-efficient windows, insulation, etc.
2) electric heat pumps
3) natgas backup to the central heat pump in case the power went out
4) large solar array

#1 was very helpful, but items #2, 3 and 4 all failed.

This chart shows the last three months of consumption (in red) and solar panel generation (in green) for my house.

As cold weather approached, household electricity consumption increased significantly. However, instead of increasing steadily, demand for my heat pump was very choppy. I only had 5 minutes of heating per hour. Why is this?

Because the city turned the heat pump on & off.

My house is enrolled in the Power Partners program, which lets @austinenegy cycle my A/C on/off in the summer for a few minutes at a time to reduce peak demand. Across all the city’s air conditioners, it saves 50+ MW of peak demand, which is significant.

savings.austinenergy.com/rebates/reside…

I had no idea that they would also use that ability to cycle my heat pump (essentially a reversed A/C) on/off. In the summer they might turn off my A/C a few mins/hour. But the depth of the energy crisis was so bad the situation was reversed: I only had heat a few mins/hour.

Our insulation helped a lot…but still, the house got really cold.

You can see that the solar generation dropped significantly from cloud cover and from snowfall. Snow on solar panels melts faster than on roads, but the panels were basically out of commission on February 15th.

We finally lost power that Wednesday the 17th.

The power outage lasted 2.5 days, which is really visible on the chart (👆). My wife and I read by candlelight.

https://twitter.com/MichaelEWebber/status/1362576890205114372?s=20

Unfortunately, solar panels don’t work when the power is out unless the home has a battery (for safety reasons: if solar panels send power back onto the wires, it can electrocute line workers making repairs). I don’t have a battery so my house lost power despite the solar panels.

But what about the gas backup for my heating system?

The gas backup (and gas water heater) have electronic controls, ignition, blower, etc. When the power went out, I also lost my gas heat.

The house got even colder. Not quite life-threatening, but we were headed that way.

Overall, despite significant investments in heat pumps, solar panels and gas backup, my house was still very vulnerable.

Someone (me!) who has the interest, relevant knowledge & means to make a home more robust can still fail to identify vulnerabilities looming in the system.

So what do I do next?

Install a battery that is at least big enough to power the controls, blower & ignition for the gas backup heating system.

If I get a big battery it can run the compressor for the electric heat pump and A/C.

The quest for resilience isn't over! [END]

Dear @threadreaderapp please unroll.