New York State Electric and Gas Corporation (NYSEG) serves central, eastern, and western New York State, an area which, though mostly rural, includes the cities of Binghamton, Elmira, Corning, and Ithaca. Its territory includes one-third of the state's land area and a tenth of its population. With more than 775,000 electric customers and almost 220,000 gas customers, NYSEG serves a diversified population of industry, agriculture, recreational facilities, and colleges and universities.
NYSEG traces its history back to October 28, 1852, when six Ithaca businessmen pledged a total of $75,000 and incorporated as the Ithaca Gas Light Company. The fledgling company soon laid mains and built a coal gas plant. In 1853 Ithaca's streets saw their first lamps.
In the thirty years following the founding of Ithaca Gas Light, the use of methane gas grew steadily. Street lighting was extended beyond affluent business districts, while homeowners and businesses obtained lights for evening hours.
This always was an odd plant is how it was connected to NYSEG' grid. Essentially the output of the plant was connected to NYPA's Niagara - Edic line. The electricity was transfered to the Pennsylvania grid which in turn back feed it to the massive coal fired plant in Homer City outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania which in turn has a 345 kV line that runs from Homer City Pennsylvania to Elmira which powers a lot of the NYSEG electric grid.
But all and all, it's actually a pretty modern coal plant with good scrubbers but uneconomic to operate with the low cost of natural gas and the high cost of the fees associated with moving the energy such a crazy way.
The New York Power Authority is moving to isolate 85 critical employees at power plant and control room sites across the state to ensure the lights stay on, CEO Gil Quiniones told POLITICO.
The NYPA employees have been tested for the coronavirus and are all expected to be isolated, if they come back negative, by Saturday. The unprecedented step amid the growing health crisis in New York City and across the country reflects NYPA’s importance to the state’s electric system.
Fluctuating solar and wind power require lots of energy storage, and lithium-ion batteries seem like the obvious choice—but they are far too expensive to play a major role.
It's a problem of magnitude -- not so much an issue of actually storing electricity. Electricity is the difference in atomic potential, it doesn't like to be stored, and while we can store it in small quantities, the amount generated to light whole cities up is a challenge.
Reading a book on the electrical code makes me realize how much safer newer homes are compared to older homes. And they’re still making buildings a lot safer with the latest revisions of the code. The safety improvements in the building code are not unlike safety standards in automobile industry – they continue to reduce fires and death from shocks – often in very substantial ways.
It would be easy to believe that this means a great victory for the planet, that the demise of fossil fuels is incoming, that environmentalism has won and that climate change will soon be a thing of the past. Yet the foul smell emerging from tax-dodging transnationals jumping all together into a bandwagon cannot be ignored.
Despite their claims, none of the companies in the RE100 list is actually going to receive all of its energy from renewable sources. The “100% renewable” label is a fasade, a marketing gimmick used by corporations to pretend they are the good guys while their unfettered thirst for profits continues unopposed. This corporate lie is enabled by the abuse of Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) which allow companies to buy their way into “green” without having to change any of their practices.
Yes, I should report some of the high number of street lights out in my neighborhood… :idea:
I’ve noticed lately that there are many street lights out in my neighborhood when I go for my evening walk. In some cases there are whole blocks of sidewalk with the lights out. Reporting street lights out is easy online. I am sure dozens of neighbors have also walked by them and not reported them either.
But National Grid is legally required to send out a crew and repair them, and not only does working street lights improve safety, it also means that town street lighting district tax payers are getting what they pay for – they pay a flat rate for each street light whether or not it is actually on and burning electricity or is burned out and dark.