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The Electrical Power Research Institute asked a series of truly scary questions in preparation for its September 9-10 national meeting.
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Given this scenario:
At 00:00:03 on the morning of January 1, 2000, approximately 20-25% of the on line plants on the North American continent trip and go off line; approximately 20-30% of the protective switch gear fails to operate correctly; leading to the loss of another 20% of the on line generation.
What are the answers to these questions?
What will be the characteristics of a blackout created by the above scenario?
What types of sensors do we need at a Utility's Tie Points to recognize and react to the type of blackout which would result from the above scenario in time to successfully isolate the local network?
Should a local utility be able to isolate itself from this rolling blackout, what will be the impact of this disturbance on local generation systems if they have been net providers of power to the grid? If they have been net consumers of power from the grid?
What will be the impact of the time zones? I see different scenarios for each time zone, the one ahead, the current one, and the one behind. In the Central Time Zone, we can get hit with problems from the East Coast and the Rocky Mountains as well as our own area.
What will be the impact of the Rocky Mountains for protecting us from West Coast problems?
What generation strategies should be followed to minimize the impact of the above scenario should we loose one of our plants while we are isolating from the grid?
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