Fogbow

Phoenix520 wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 2:44 pm A couple of inches of SNOW are forecast for my city! Today or tomorrow.

ETA LA is issuing its first EVAR blizzard warning!

Azastan wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 9:43 pm We had quite the accumulation of graupel yesterday, with a bit sticking around even through today. Haven't seen any snow yet here in the south King County hinterlands (and would like to keep it that way).

Friends down in Chehalis and Yelm report heavy snowfall, so I am going to be realistic and figure we will get hit later in the night.

Foggy wrote: ↑Thu Feb 23, 2023 7:06 am It's gonna be 82° today.

Azastan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 23, 2023 11:14 am No snow in the hinterlands of South King County, but COLD and WINDY. Per my usual early morning activities, I went out to feed horses around 6.30 and half an hour later, headed back to the house with close-to-frostbitten fingers.

With wind chill it felt like 10 degrees F, so still warmer than what many of you have, but it's going to stay cold today, barely getting above freezing.

But at least there's no snow!

‘Strongest snowstorm in years’ leaves Californians delighted and frozen
The Hollywood sign was dusted in white as arctic air blew across the state, triggering blizzard warnings for the first time since 1989

Gabrielle Canon in San Francisco
Sat 25 Feb 2023 06.00 GMT

Swaths of the Golden State were doused in white this week as a historic storm cast much of the US in a bitter chill – and forecasters say there’s more frosty weather in store.

The snowstorm hovering over the southern part of California could end up becoming one for the record books as typically balmy areas brace for a barrage of more blizzard conditions and blustery winds. Across the state this week, the snowline has already crept far downslope from its winter territory atop high-elevation peaks, dusting foothills and valleys closer to the coast, and even some beaches.

“It is definitely the strongest storm we have had in many years,” said Eric Boldt, a warning coordination meteorologist for the National Weather Service in southern California. And it isn’t all bad news.




https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... o-bay-area

After a series of winter storms, regulators approve new standards for power plants

Two years after Winter Storm Uri, which caused a massive power failure in Texas that caused more than 200 deaths, and just two months after another storm, Elliott, forced blackouts in parts of the South, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has approved new extreme-cold reliability standards for power plants.

However, the vote last week on the standards came with the acknowledgement by the commission that the new rules don’t go nearly far enough. The commission sent the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, the nonprofit regulator that sets and enforces reliability standards for the bulk power system in the U.S., back to the drawing board in several respects.

“There are a number of good measures in what we accept today to be sure,” FERC Commissioner Allison Clements said. “But the critical generator weatherization requirements as they were proposed, to be frank, are not up to the task.”

Extreme cold weather, like the temperatures seen during Uri and Elliott, can knock out power plants that haven’t been adequately winterized.

During Uri, natural gas, coal and nuclear plants, as well as wind turbines, failed to hit their expected output, per a report by the University of Texas at Austin. More than 52,000 megawatts of generation went offline during the event, about 40% of the total capacity in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which runs the electric grid for most of the state. Problems included frozen lines and valves, boiler issues, iced turbine blades and other problems. In 2021, natural gas generation made up more than 50% of ERCOT’s capacity in 2021, with wind about 25%.

In December, as Elliott sent temperatures rapidly plunging across much of the central and eastern United States, gas and coal plants tripped offline, forcing Duke Energy in North Carolina and the Tennessee Valley Authority to order rolling blackouts in their respective territories. PJM, the largest U.S. grid operator, overseeing an area that includes 65 million people and all or part of 13 states and the District of Columbia, implored customers to conserve electricity as 46,000 megawatts of power generation, mostly natural gas and coal plants, went offline because of fuel supply problems and equipment failures.

And in Texas this winter, despite new weatherization standards for power plants approved last year, power plants still failed to perform because of both fuel shortages and other problems.