Failing infrastructure

Discussion in 'Back to Basics' started by oil pan 4, Jan 31, 2019.


  1. oil pan 4

    oil pan 4 Monkey+++

    Well this winter has exposed cracks in the infrastructure.
    Gas companies asking people to turn their home thermostats down to 60F.
    Localized natural gas outages when they do.
    Along with numerous localized power outages.
    At least 31 state highways closed.

    Yeah I am getting a bigger wood stove.
    What do you think?
     
    UncleMorgan, marlas1too, GOG and 12 others like this.
  2. Merkun

    Merkun furious dreamer

    A good backup, or even primary, as long as your back holds out.
     
    UncleMorgan, techsar, Ura-Ki and 2 others like this.
  3. Ura-Ki

    Ura-Ki Grampa Monkey

    We have heard several areas have run out of heating oil, many areas are with out power, and folks are freezing to death! About what i expected when people dont take the warnings seriously. Sukz, but survival is on those who choose to act.
    I learned as a kid living in the foothills or Oregon, you laid in more fire wood then you think you will need, and you laid in extra lamp oil. You had all the food you would need to get through any situation, and cojld even help your neighbours. We didnt rely on the State of the Gooberment and we survived! There was a year where the temps were below zero for over a month, the power was out, and fuel was scarce for those who didnt keep any on site. We were happy, healthy, and comfortable the whole time, hardly noticing the bad weather!
     
  4. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    The real fail in infrastructure here in NH is political rather than structural. Attempts have been made to improve roads, NIMBY, might endanger a butterfly, or displace a beaver, run power lines down from Canada with cheap hydro power, can't build power lines along roads, would destroy the pristine nature of the national forest, put in a new natural gas line, may blow up, not needed, they are going to make money selling natural gas, fracked in New York, and that is immoral, build wind power, I can see it from the nature preserve if I use binoculars, etc, most of the money for the legal costs and organizers is coming from out of state and if they had their way, we would all be moved out and the area returned to a wilderness with a few starving natives tolerated. Then there is the "big dig" road project in Boston which was to cost about 3 billion, ended up about 15 billion, still being paid for, and as far as I can see created more traffic and made the delays worse. The proposed rail links were never built. Manchester NH airport spent about 120 million to build a connector and a bridge from the interstate to the airport with 4 million people using the airport, since then the number using the airport has dropped to about 2 million a year. Much of our infrastructure money seems to be spent on expensive projects, high speed rail in California, where some political goal is to be achieved and seldom anything that actually improves or creates new usable infrastructure. Local bridge built in 1990's cost about 100 thousand, new one 2017, cost 1.6 million. Don't know the answer, but design, testing, etc of new bridge cost more than total cost of old projects, and that was replacing existing structures, can take years to get approvals for any new construction.
     
  5. Thunder5Ranch

    Thunder5Ranch Monkey+++

    Several Communities here have had repeated power outages the last two days and one had all the piping in and out of their water tower freeze during the outages. With no back up power at the water facility. Always like the folks that its OK I have Natural Gas for heat................... I think how quaint but how well does yer furnace work without electricity. Another town has had one water main rupture after another which made fer some pretty ice sculptures on the sides of the road. Thousands of pot holes magically appeared over two days, that will get fixed sometime in the next 10 years. Not sure why -20s knocked so much electric service out, that is not something I know much about. Used to the power going out if the wind blows more than a gentle breeze but we have not even had any wind........... just cold and 1/2 inch of light fluffy snow.
     
  6. Thunder5Ranch

    Thunder5Ranch Monkey+++

    This reminds me of all the Obama Shovel Ready money that went that congressional district that doesn't exist :)
     
  7. Ura-Ki

    Ura-Ki Grampa Monkey

    Or even better, right after Mt. Saint
    Helens blew, the State bought up every broom in the North West and then was selling them door to door! They told every one it was to keep the stores from jacking the prices, while the state jacked the prices and made a small fortune!
     
  8. Gray Wolf

    Gray Wolf Monkey+++

    When I lived in Oregon, we only used 5 cords of firewood for heating, even in the coldest of winters. I cut and split 8 cords every year. The extra was for disabled vets and elderly folks.
     
  9. Cruisin Sloth

    Cruisin Sloth Special & Slow

    When the SHTF here in storms , I see the failures ,
    I try to help on A small scale .
    When more than a week out of power or snowed in etc,, many who live rural like I ,,, think of them are being in a city/town (frigging Idiots )
    one food store (of size {with the most expensive }) and it has maybe a week of food .. .
    With a earthquake or more , many who live the paycheck to payments will be the problems,, !! They might also have tans , as I glow in the dark in these months .

    Sloth
     
  10. Bandit99

    Bandit99 Monkey+++ Site Supporter+

    I would like a bigger propane tank, a thousand gallons, buried. I currently have 250 and only use it for cooking but have a propane fireplace which is an a$$ kicker when use with its fan, sort of an emergency backup if needed. Frankly, the last 2 winters we have been using wood. The wood stove was expensive but I think worth every penny if for nothing more than it gives me freedom. I can heat my home with no help from anyone because I have that much wood on my property.
     
  11. Thunder5Ranch

    Thunder5Ranch Monkey+++

    The electric Company with the most outages explained why there were so many power outages the last two days on the news last night. It was a very scientific and thorough explanation. "Some of the components of the system did not like the cold." The End :)
     
  12. DKR

    DKR Raconteur of the first stripe


    My SIL is at Winterfest in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin .

    Normally a pretty cold spot in the winter. They had to evacuate the hotel they staying in due to the busted pipes - seems the heater couldn't keep up with the cold.

    Lake Geneva Ice Castles temporarily closed

    Winterfest & Snow Sculpting Competition | Travel Wisconsin

    Temps will be in the high 30s tomorrow...with rain predicted.
     
    UncleMorgan and Gator 45/70 like this.
  13. arleigh

    arleigh Goophy monkey

    I have a simple antique wood cook stove and I am strongly considering lining the inside with fire brick so that I can burn charcoal and coal besides wood and gas If I need to .
     
    UncleMorgan, Gator 45/70 and oldman11 like this.
  14. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    It's funny how mother nature works. We as humans try to make the systems we use, electric, gas, etc less prone to failure, which we all consider a good thing. But the problem is it makes us as individuals (speaking collectively and generically) not have to face small outages and be prepared the next time. What happens is we have big failures and more people get injured or die.

    Our systems need to fail from time to time, including having no pay checks, so that people wake up and become more self sufficient. I know I am preaching to the choir here at the monkey. But failure is not a bad thing when we learn from it. We are all here because we have faced failure or adversity. Most of you talk like the people who live pay check to pay check or are not prepared for an outage are weak. I say they are uneducted because they have not failed enough. (I admit some people will never take care of themselves no matter what but setting those people aside) Failure is a great teacher

    One of the things I love about the LDS church is they teach self sufficiency on both financial and physical level. We don't have that in the rest of the world.
     
  15. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    We heat with wood almost exclusively. When it gets really cold, we have electric base board heat in the bedrooms but typically those don't go on until we've had a solid week below zero.

    Anyway, 2 fireplace inserts and about 7 full cords of wood per year keep us quite toasty.
    For backup I have 2 additional wood stoves that I can move into place in the breezeway port into a ready chimney pipe if either of the others fail or we are going to go below zero for months and need additional heat.

    I'm just waiting for the government to ban all wood stoves. At that point you may hear about an incident in the SE Mitten, it'll probably include a body count with the report.
     
  16. Gator 45/70

    Gator 45/70 Monkey+++

    I wonder if one could take an old wood burning stove,Install the natural gas or propane brick gates inside and use that to heat?
    Kinda like the Trogan horse of heaters.
     
    UncleMorgan and oldman11 like this.
  17. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    astove.
     
  18. Gator 45/70

    Gator 45/70 Monkey+++

    [ROFL][fnny][ROFL][hrt][fnny][fnny]
     
    UncleMorgan and oldman11 like this.
  19. Tempstar

    Tempstar Monkey+++

    I'll relate this: Our power monitoring system at our remote transmitter site begins alerting during very cold weather about four am. It settles out and begins again at the top of each hour. It is simpy folks getting up, turning up the heat, using the stove, water heater, etc. Our voltage dropped from the normal 492 to 451 on Thursday. Our power rep (yeah, we have a rep since we use $26000 a month) explained that the 13,200 volt lines are 23 miles long from the 115,00 volt sub station, and the increased population has maxed out the capacity, yet there are no plans for revisions because most of the customers are residential and there is no money to be made.
     
    UncleMorgan, Gator 45/70 and oldman11 like this.
  20. oil pan 4

    oil pan 4 Monkey+++

    Where I work our power bill is around $20,000 per day.
     
    UncleMorgan, Gator 45/70 and oldman11 like this.
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