Juneau avalanche destroys 1.5 miles of powerline

[~mikey b]

from KINY...

Gayle Wood of Alaska Electric Light and Power says it happened at about four this morning. (Wednesday)

She says it was hardly noticed, except by Thane Road residents, because of diesel generation they had running at the time and low load demands at that hour.

She says it was a massive avalanche about three miles from the Snettisham power house that took out about a mile and a half of transmission line. That includes damage to four to five towers, she says.

Wood says the community will be virtually reliant on diesel generated power for two to three months with the exception of power that can be generated through the Gold Creek, Salmon Creek and Annex Creek facilities.

The electric utility official says customers can expect to see some very high bills.

Residential rates were at 11 cents per kilowatt hour.

Wood initially estimated it would go to 30 to 35 cents, but has since revised that figure to 50 cents and adds that's a conservative figure.

Since the area is very unstable, Wood says they don't expect to start repairs for two to three weeks since they need to wait for avalanche danger to subside. She describes the terrain in the area as very steep. At this point, they're trying to assess the damage from the air.

Wood calls it the worst disaster they've ever had on the Snettisham line. She used the word "catastrophic" and called it "a hard hit."

Wood stressed the importance of conservation during this time. Right now, she says they're trying to figure out how to secure enough diesel to handle this kind of long term need.

many issues here: urban avalanche hazard in Juneau, Juneau Access Road, huge economic and social impact, a city of 30,000 totally reliant on deisel generators....

I've spent quite a bit of time in the air, on the water, and on the ground in the area of the avalanche - pretty rugged terrain.

[~mikey b]

Courtesy of Alaska Electric Light and Power

A massive avalanche April 16, 2008, near Juneau took out more than a mile of the transmission lines for hydroelectric power into Juneau. There is an intact transmission tower in the background of the photo (left, on the ridge) and leading toward the camera is the transmission clearing, which disappears into part of the slide area.

[montanaskier]

WOW......that thing is massive.

[bio-smear]

WOW....$.50 per kWh!!!!

[Dhelihiker]

Good thing its light out from 4am to midnight

[BakerBoy]

So we're supposed to feel sorry for these Alaskans with their self-imposed energy crisis' when Alaskan citizens get yearly kickbacks from the sale of their oil, and their representatives in Congress want to build $300 million dollar bridges that don't do shit? Actually, that's not really fair, since it got canceled, but somebody still thought it was a good idea.

"...huge economic and social impact, a city of 30,000 totally reliant on diesel generators...."

Somebody please flame me wrong, but what kind of HUGE economic and social impact does a city of 30,000 have on the grand scheme of things? Compare this level of discomfort to people in Burma, and explain.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/14/...to-nowhere-ii/

I'm just being the asshole, but still.

[Nathan Explosion]

So we're supposed to feel sorry for these Alaskans with their self-imposed energy crisis' when Alaskan citizens get yearly kickbacks from the sale of their oil, and their representatives in Congress want to build $300 million dollar bridges that don't do shit? Actually, that's not really fair, since it got canceled, but somebody still thought it was a good idea.

"...huge economic and social impact, a city of 30,000 totally reliant on diesel generators...."

Somebody please flame me wrong, but what kind of HUGE economic and social impact does a city of 30,000 have on the grand scheme of things? Compare this level of discomfort to people in Burma, and explain.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/14/...to-nowhere-ii/

I'm just being the asshole, but still.

You're right, you are an asshole. The economic and social impact it has, dipshit, is that it's a city of 30,000 running on diesel paid for by YOUR TAXES. It's an isolated city of 30,000 that could be completely without of electricity if they were to lose their access to diesel for some reason. And this happened quite some time before Burma if i remember as well.

So shut the fuck up.

[axebiker]

Has anyone here read "Snowstruck"? Great book - shows just how "little" you are in the face of some of the Alaskan Slides. I highly recommend it.

[Yeti]

Namecalling aside, I've been following this topic with interest for a few years. I'm involved in electricity generation, transmission planning, and reliability elsewhere in the country. I realize the geography of Juneau imposes some thorny constraints on power supply, but running off diesels is just plain nuts in today's economy. In New England, customers with the ability to self-supply electricity through diesels have historically been given discount distribution rates from the local utilities to keep the customers on the grid; in the past year, that opportunity has totally gone away, since diesel self-supply is more expensive to customers than even New England's pricy power.

AE&LP gets (got?) almost all their power from the 78MW hydro facility located about 30 miles away. Folks don't like living near generation facilities, even "green" ones like hydro plants -- and yet that (often legitimate) NIMBYism can lead to overextended transmission grids. In light of what I know about this line, from Snowstruck and from my amateur digging into this incident, the Snettisham transmission line is the weak link. From a reliability perspective, both in terms of keeping the lights on and keeping costs to customers low, I'd think there may be a better way to have distributed generation closer to Juneau.

Just my 11 cents, which would have bought you a Juneau kWh this fall.

[summit]

Galena AK has found a solution:





http://www.atomicinsights.com/AI_03-20-05.html