Californians out of electricity cant get gasoline to generators!

[SilverSolder]

Well, if one mile firebreaks, or more, is what it takes to do it properly...  it kind of is what it is?

[free_electron]

Who, other than the taxpayers, should be footing the bill for building modern housing estates with safe utilities, managed forests, firebreaks, and the rest of it?

How about the greedy housing developers ? Same house between CA and for example middle-of-nowhere Texas, or potato-county Idaho : In CA : 1.9 million. In middle Texas 700K, in Idaho : 300K ...
how can you logically explain the same time too build, same materials, same size to have such a difference in cost ? it's not labor or material cost. it's greedy developers examining the market, seeing there is a shortage and milking all they can.

Oh, and let's not forget politicians and city governments changing zoning so they can get lots more income as well. and get their re-election campaign coffers stuffed.
Politicians should be required to wear jackets like race car drivers : with the logos of their sponsored embroidered. the larger the logo the larger the donation was.

As for Pacific Greedy Executives ( PG&E) : they gave the CEO a 40 million $ bonus ... but ask em to mow the grass under their power-line trajectories and you will hear 'that costs too much money'.
This whole power-shut-of farce is a facade to break open a debate about that compensation fund.
Their infrastructure is old and creaky and they can't bear the costs of maintenance. In all the time i have lived here there have been numerous fires and they have NEVER shut off the power. But last year they got sued big time for negligence and now they come crying for help.

Time to change the system : micro-grids , street-level grids , solar on the roof, battery packs, bloom boxes and other stuff. You won't need big heavy distribution grids. And bury the cables. no risk for spitzensparken , no eye-sore in the landscape.

[rstofer]

[...] This has been a taxpayer scam from the beginning. [...]

Who, other than the taxpayers, should be footing the bill for building modern housing estates with safe utilities, managed forests, firebreaks, and the rest of it?

It looks like nobody has wanted to pay for developing and implementing an overall sensible approach to what looks like a fairly predictable problem?

Individual homeowners that live in the areas.  There's no reason for flatlander taxpayers to fund fire losses for the forest dwellers.

"Estates" is an interesting word.  I don't know what it means in this context but I associate it with very high density housing - like towers and such.  That's a crap way to live.  I much prefer a single family dwelling on a small piece of dirt.  Actually, I prefer a bigger piece of dirt but the commute becomes unreasonable.

[rstofer]

Who, other than the taxpayers, should be footing the bill for building modern housing estates with safe utilities, managed forests, firebreaks, and the rest of it?

How about the greedy housing developers ? Same house between CA and for example middle-of-nowhere Texas, or potato-county Idaho : In CA : 1.9 million. In middle Texas 700K, in Idaho : 300K ...
how can you logically explain the same time too build, same materials, same size to have such a difference in cost ? it's not labor or material cost. it's greedy developers examining the market, seeing there is a shortage and milking all they can.

It is easily explained by scarcity.  There is only so much dirt and they aren't making any more.  There are inexpensive houses built in California all the time but they are so far away from the job centers that it isn't even possible to commute.

Then there is money.  There is so much money in and around Silicon Valley that house prices are not the primary concern.  The prices keep going up because the wages keep going up because the demand for magic keeps going up.

It's been a long time since I bought a house on the outskirts of the Silicon Valley.  I bought a SMALL 3 bedroom house in '86 for about $81k.  I sold it in '03 for $291k and it is now worth $390k.  But wages are much higher today than they were 33 years ago.  Even $81k was stupid when compared to the house I bought, brand new, for $35k in '72.

Not only have tech wages gone up, so have construction costs from wages, materials and new building codes.  Everything is more expensive.

And, yes, the developers need to make a profit.  I don't imagine, in aggregate, that it is obscene.  If it were, the news people would be all over it.  There are some very large developers building a lot of homes but nobody stands out as the next billionaire.

Then there are zoning laws.  Our City was sued by the Sierra Club into constraining all new housing into backfilling existing areas rather than expanding outwards.  That means tearing down old buildings and making new housing, probably high-rise, on the same site.  Great!  No money in it but great!  But then the City was sued into retaining the old buildings because they are historical.  OK, maybe we can still work something out.  Nope!  Fire and earthquake codes have changed and even the exterior construction can't be saved.  So, they stay abandoned because they can't be demolished and they can't be upgraded.  And then there is the asbestos problems...

So, even if somebody thought they could make money on low income, high-rise housing, it can't be built.  Not in our town!

And who wants to spend 6 years in college to live in high-rise housing?

[rstofer]

Time to change the system : micro-grids , street-level grids , solar on the roof, battery packs, bloom boxes and other stuff. You won't need big heavy distribution grids. And bury the cables. no risk for spitzensparken , no eye-sore in the landscape.

Starting Jan 1, 2020, all new residential housing in California will have solar panels.

https://fortune.com/2018/12/06/california-solar-panels-new-homes/

There are no real facts in the article, like how big is the array in kW, and the economists don't agree on cost or savings.

But here's the thing:  The cost to maintain electricity to the meter is paid for by energy consumed through the meter.  If PG&E isn't selling kWh, they can't afford to maintain the system at the residential level.  There's a reason why, in a solar enticing place like Hawaii, there is a 4 year wait for approval by the utility and that approval is required.  The utility is literally being forced out of business.

To be effective, an array probably needs to be around 8 kW in the Sacramento area.  We had that size and it covered all of our kWh for the year.  All we paid PG&E was the $5/month meter charge.  We were paying $0.15/kWh to the solar company instead of $0.35/kWh to PG&E,

One of the rules:  You can't be a 'net generator'.  PG&E doesn't want to buy back solar energy from residential so, at the end of the year, if you generate more than your needs, the utility will pay only $0.04/kWh, if that.

I don't know if these "Power Purchase Agreements" are still popular.  Maybe not.  We liked it because we didn't pay for the installation and only paid $0.15/kWh for actual generation.

Battery systems are going to be a maintenance nightmare.

I'm not sure that battery systems can provide enough kW to cook Thanksgiving dinner.  One of the things about solar is that it is useful for kWh but not so much for kW.  I doubt I can afford a battery system large enough to run a 5 ton HVAC unit along with the usual kitchen appliances along with another couple of horsepower for a garbage disposal and the all important well pump (also 2 HP, I believe).  There's a reason the house has a 200A service.

[rstofer]

Well, if one mile firebreaks, or more, is what it takes to do it properly...  it kind of is what it is?

That kind of ruins the reason for living there!  Besides, you're overlooking the part where the environmentalists have blocked any logging, even firebreaks.  They're not too keen on burning the debris either.

Every group that gets a say puts limits on how people, other than themselves, can live.

[Marco]

Someone suggested housing pressure was the reason. Any way, I doubt a mile is necessary. Just use the minimum distance where fire fighters feel safe issuing no evacuation order. A pair of eyes for almost every building will spot fires a whole lot quicker than just the fire fighters.

Also, a more expensive alternative to putting the firebreak at the edge of a town is putting it farther out and carefully maintaining wooded vegetation near the town. A pretty fuel break with species selection and yearly raking next to the town then a proper firebreak next to that, because fuel breaks are half measures.

[SilverSolder]

Well, if one mile firebreaks, or more, is what it takes to do it properly...  it kind of is what it is?

That kind of ruins the reason for living there!  [...]

Fine, then we just have to admit that the houses are disposable!   - Perhaps they could have really strong concrete basements, so only the above ground part needs to be rebuilt every few years?

The problem is similar to building on a flood plain:  you just know that it isn't a long term investment!

[rstofer]

Well, if one mile firebreaks, or more, is what it takes to do it properly...  it kind of is what it is?

That kind of ruins the reason for living there!  [...]

Fine, then we just have to admit that the houses are disposable!   - Perhaps they could have really strong concrete basements, so only the above ground part needs to be rebuilt every few years?

The problem is similar to building on a flood plain:  you just know that it isn't a long term investment!

That's pretty much what they do in tornado country.  Everybody has an ultra strong basement.  The house may wind up in Kansas but the basement is still in place.

"You know the difference between a tornado and divorce in the south? Nothing! Someone is losing a trailer." - Robin Williams

Of course, the Central Valley is very close to sea level.  The New Year's Day 1997 flood was pretty exciting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floods_in_California

A lot of houses on farms were flooded up 3 feet or so.  They soon rebuilt but they built pads above that level.  It was surreal seeing all that water where there used to be dirt.

[NiHaoMike]

I'm not sure that battery systems can provide enough kW to cook Thanksgiving dinner.  One of the things about solar is that it is useful for kWh but not so much for kW.  I doubt I can afford a battery system large enough to run a 5 ton HVAC unit along with the usual kitchen appliances along with another couple of horsepower for a garbage disposal and the all important well pump (also 2 HP, I believe).  There's a reason the house has a 200A service.

There's no real reason to run HVAC from battery (except as a buffer to get around the dynamic range limitations of standard compressors) when thermal storage is orders of magnitude cheaper. In fact, it turns out that running a conventional air conditioner from batteries at best only gives marginally more cooling per pound than simply making ice. Similarly, hot water can also make use of thermal storage and in most homes, already does to an extent.

Many large residential loads (e.g. cooking and power tools) tend to be "bursty" in that they need a lot of peak but don't actually run for long. (The only time I ever use the full 1.8kW of my induction cooker is at the start to heat up the pot, something that only takes minutes at most.)

[Marco]

In fact, it turns out that running a conventional air conditioner from batteries at best only gives marginally more cooling per pound than simply making ice.

Looking around, somewhere between 2 and 1.5 more.

[NiHaoMike]

Looking around, somewhere between 2 and 1.5 more.

The combination of more advanced battery technology and a super efficient air conditioner does sway it a bit (note that I specifically did not consider geothermal due to its high cost), but for a stationary application where weight is of little importance, it's hard to beat the really low cost of water as a thermal storage medium. (Actually, you could drain the tanks and end up with something that doesn't weigh much for transport...)

[Marco]

Actually I'm probably underestimating what an ice freezer could get as COP ... a couple degrees below zero instead of 18 below like a deep freezer should mostly close to gap to air conditioners.

But splits and window air conditioners are dirt cheap commodity items, ice storage air conditioning not so much.

[Red Squirrel]

Seems fire breaks could make sense, destroy lot of trees but prevents even more from being destroyed by fire.  Put solar farms on the fire break areas and put that power towards the general area and the extra towards desalination plants.  Kill two birds with one stone.

[NiHaoMike]

But splits and window air conditioners are dirt cheap commodity items, ice storage air conditioning not so much.

Could be as simple as a central A/C condensing unit connected to some copper tubing placed inside some storage tanks, then use a pump to circulate cold water through some radiators. Not much more complex than a conventional A/C.


What I actually plan to build is quite a bit more complex (e.g. a switchable displacement compressor and an oil separator right after the desuperheater), but that's mostly to get more dynamic range in order to be better able to adapt to the varying solar production. It's too bad that A/C compressors with provision to connect an external oil pump are so expensive, since that's what would allow a very wide dynamic range for the compressor itself. (And high dynamic range expansion valves are even harder to find, luckily there's a workaround by using several cheap "standard" expansion valves.)

[IanB]

"Estates" is an interesting word.  I don't know what it means in this context but I associate it with very high density housing - like towers and such.  That's a crap way to live.  I much prefer a single family dwelling on a small piece of dirt.  Actually, I prefer a bigger piece of dirt but the commute becomes unreasonable.

"Housing estate" = "subdivision". A tract of land which is divided up into plots to build houses on.

(The word "subdivision" does not exist in Britain. If you use that word there you will not be understood.)

[orion242]

Looking around, somewhere between 2 and 1.5 more.

The combination of more advanced battery technology and a super efficient air conditioner does sway it a bit (note that I specifically did not consider geothermal due to its high cost), but for a stationary application where weight is of little importance, it's hard to beat the really low cost of water as a thermal storage medium. (Actually, you could drain the tanks and end up with something that doesn't weigh much for transport...)

Sounds good, and its done in commercial.  To do so in residential is silly expensive.   All the generation is mainly when there is no load.  When its needed its all storage.  All the extra gear required for the limited input, snowballs chance in hell there is a ROI in any reasonable time frame.  If you build the home and plan on dying in it, maybe you can make the math work.

[NiHaoMike]

Sounds good, and its done in commercial.  To do so in residential is silly expensive.   All the generation is mainly when there is no load.  When its needed its all storage.  All the extra gear required for the limited input, snowballs chance in hell there is a ROI in any reasonable time frame.  If you build the home and plan on dying in it, maybe you can make the math work.

There's nothing in a basic thermal storage system that's particularly expensive, don't even need a fancy variable speed compressor if you just want to use grid power during off peak times.

What does get tricky is if you want to (try to) match the compressor power draw to solar production. There's currently little demand for "small" (a few tons of capacity or less) high dynamic range compressors outside of scientific equipment, meaning high costs. The minimum operating speed of a conventional compressor is usually limited by the use of a centrifugal oil pump. Hence my idea to use a switchable displacement compressor in order to get more dynamic range within the operating speed limits, which isn't that much more expensive than a fixed displacement compressor. The compressors that can have external oil pumps connected are way more expensive (haven't seen any under $1000, compared to switchable displacement compressors that are about $400 for a 4.5 ton), at which point I may as well just put the cost towards upsizing the battery a little to use as a buffer.

Oil collecting in the evaporator also limits the minimum capacity, hence the use of an oil separator. There's also the trick of adding a little bit of a higher boiling point hydrocarbon such as R600a to thin out oil in the evaporator and help carry it back to the compressor. (Sadly, compressors with oil level sight glasses are also really expensive, so I'll just have to stay conservative with handling the oil return problem.)

[Nusa]

"Estates" is an interesting word.  I don't know what it means in this context but I associate it with very high density housing - like towers and such.  That's a crap way to live.  I much prefer a single family dwelling on a small piece of dirt.  Actually, I prefer a bigger piece of dirt but the commute becomes unreasonable.

"Housing estate" = "subdivision". A tract of land which is divided up into plots to build houses on.

(The word "subdivision" does not exist in Britain. If you use that word there you will not be understood.)

But without the word "housing", estates are large pieces of land with a large residence for a single family on it. If it's near developing areas, it may become a housing estate if the family sells. Might be how that term evolved.

In any event, this thread has more to do with rural areas than densely developed ones. And the people that choose to live in them.

[IanB]

"Housing estate" = "subdivision". A tract of land which is divided up into plots to build houses on.

(The word "subdivision" does not exist in Britain. If you use that word there you will not be understood.)

But without the word "housing", estates are large pieces of land with a large residence for a single family on it. If it's near developing areas, it may become a housing estate if the family sells. Might be how that term evolved.

Not necessarily so in Britain. An estate may be that, but it is also the standard term for a housing development in a town. Similarly there is no word "realtor" in British English. Real estate agents in Britain are known as estate agents.

In any event, this thread has more to do with rural areas than densely developed ones. And the people that choose to live in them.

As for fires, my experience of California wildfires is they have affected plenty of people in cities and densely populated areas. I my part of the world whole chunks of Oceanside, Vista, San Marcos, Carlsbad and even Del Mar have been evacuated due to nearby fires in recent years. Houses make perfectly good fuel for fires, and whole subdivisions have been incinerated. One house goes up and they all do.

[rstofer]

As for fires, my experience of California wildfires is they have affected plenty of people in cities and densely populated areas. I my part of the world whole chunks of Oceanside, Vista, San Marcos, Carlsbad and even Del Mar have been evacuated due to nearby fires in recent years. Houses make perfectly good fuel for fires, and whole subdivisions have been incinerated. One house goes up and they all do.

The houses are easy to ignite if they have the ever popular "shake shingle" roofing material - basically, split wood.
Our house has an aluminum roof as do a few others around here.  I don't know if it was installed for fire protection or just to frustrate the spooks.  In any event, we save a lot of money on tinfoil.

Almost all of California is capable of burning - except for the desert areas.  At the moment, utility sponsored fires are getting all the press but that isn't the normal situation.  More often than not, fires are started by lightning or human activity including arson.  We have a LOT of arson in the state.  Not all related to wildfires but enough.

https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/crime_courts/2018/08/06/california-arson-how-common/912413002/

Sometimes fire fighters get into arson:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Leonard_Orr

[NiHaoMike]

Why isn't it more common to build houses out of more fire resistant materials like brick and steel in high fire risk areas?

[DimitriP]

Why isn't it more common to build houses out of more fire resistant materials like brick and steel in high fire risk areas?

Building code obviously doesn't require that.
Building code probably exists to avoid suing the builder not to protect the home owner
Otherwise when you see a house being build in 2019 it would look a little different than a house being built in 2000 or 1990 or 1980...yet...it's the same story.
A wooden frame just like in the 1800s with a bunch of plaster and lot of nails holding everything together... progress!!

Full disclosure...where I come from, we call 200 year old buildings "new".   

[DimitriP]

Why isn't it more common to build houses out of more fire resistant materials like brick and steel in high fire risk areas?

or at least ..... https://californiachaparralblog.wordpress.com/2018/12/07/exterior-fire-sprinklers-saved-188-properties-wet-homes-dont-burn/

[tggzzz]

Full disclosure...where I come from, we call 200 year old buildings "new".[/i]   

Near me, New Alresford was founded in the 12th/13th century AD.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Alresford