Around the U.S., dealing with the vulnerability of overhead power lines — one of many problems that experts say will only get worse as the climate deteriorates — by burying them or strengthening them is spotty and disorganized on a national level, and painfully slow, at best.
Utilities say there’s no one best way to safeguard the millions of miles of U.S. power lines and that doing so would cost many billions of dollars — $3 million for a single mile of power lines by some estimates. Critics counter by pointing to the at least equally great economic costs of outages and utility-sparked wildfires. Estimated property losses for a single such wildfire, a California blaze that killed 85 last year, reached $16.5 billion.
Overall, electrical outages caused by bad weather cost the U.S. economy up to $33 billion in an average year — and more, in an especially bad weather year, the Energy Department estimated in 2013. The researchers estimated there were 679 widespread outages from harsh weather between 2003 and 2012.
After electrical wires sparked many of California’s major wildfires in 2017 and 2018, and threatened more this autumn, many there turned their fear and anger on PG&E, the state’s largest investor-owned utility.
Vicki McCaslin, a 60-year-old repeat evacuee in the San Francisco Bay area, described spotting a PG&E worker in her neighborhood during a lull in last month’s wind and fires.
McCaslin burst into tears as she begged the utility worker to cut off power to her area before the winds and wildfires resumed, she recounted. “It scares me to death to think of those kinds of winds with our power on.”
Nationally, experts say, problems with 19th century-style set-ups of wires dangling from wooden poles will only grow as climate change increases the severity and frequency of hurricanes, wildfires, big snowstorms and other disasters like tornados.
Denne historien er fra November 29, 2019-utgaven av AppleMagazine.
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Denne historien er fra November 29, 2019-utgaven av AppleMagazine.
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NEW JERSEY OFFSHORE WIND FARM CLEARS BIG FEDERAL HURDLE AMID ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS
The federal government gave a key approval this week to an offshore wind farm in New Jersey, even as residents in the town where its power cable would come ashore worry it could go through underground toxic waste that’s still being cleaned up.
AUSTRALIA'S ONLINE DATING INDUSTRY ADOPTS CODE OF CONDUCT TO KEEP USERS SAFER
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WARREN BUFFETT BUYS REST OF BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY'S UTILITIES.BUT INVESTORS MUST GUESS AT THE PRICE
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SPACEX LAUNCHES RESCUE MISSION FOR 2 NASA ASTRONAUTS WHO ARE STUCK IN SPACE UNTIL NEXT YEAR
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TESLA POSTS FIRST QUARTERLY INCREASE IN DELIVERIES, BUT SHARES SLUMP WITH INVESTORS HOPING FOR MORE
Low interest financing, sweet lease deals, price cuts and free charging boosted Tesla’s global deliveries in the third quarter, the first increase this year for the electric vehicle maker.
ARKANSAS SUES YOUTUBE OVER CLAIMS THAT THE SITE IS FUELING A MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS
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EPIC GAMES SUES GOOGLE AND SAMSUNG OVER PHONE SETTINGS, ACCUSING THEM OF VIOLATING ANTITRUST LAWS
Video game maker Epic Games sued Google and Samsung this week, accusing the tech companies of coordinating to block third-party competition in application distribution on Samsung devices.
JAPANESE SPONSORS TOYOTA BRIDGESTONE AND PANASONIC END OLYMPIC CONTRACTS
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SATELLITE SERVICE DIRECTV BUYS RIVAL DISH AS IT FIGHTS THE ONSLAUGHT OF STREAMING SERVICES
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