[Chron/CenterPoint] : Millions of residents face another dark night

Someone from Centerpoint was on 740 today and said they were able to make some better estimates now that they are getting out into the city.

Unfortunately, that estimate that 50-75 % of power will be restored by next Tuesday.

I'm hoping that's worst case.

 

Not everybody has the discretionary income to have $500 - $1000 tied up in a generator that they might use only once every 5 - 10 - 15 -20 - 25 years.

Plus, there would be issue of obtaining fuel to keep the generator running. You could have 5 gallon can stored for emergency use, but would have a problem when it runs out.

 

We live in Sugar Land (77498 or 77478. whatever it is now). We live about Hwy. 6 and Bissonett close to Kempner HS. We still do not have power and neighbor was told by Centerpointe it won't be back on until Fri. or Sat.

 

This is where I am at. Technology hasn't progressed to stop transformers from going out at 5 and 6 o-clock on Friday? Also, why aren't more lines underground instead of on poles. This is not something I am just thinking about, I have wondered this for some time. Underground wires worked just fine downtown, so why not in other places? I hope we get power by Friday. I got called into the office today, so able to actually get on the net.

Another thing, having a fiber optic home phone line sounds cool...until you lose power. Without power, you get about one day of back-up battery and then no home phone.

 

Are you expecting them (Centerpoint, Entergy, etc) to go and trench underground to replace poles & lines that have been in existence for years?

 

I don't know why they couldn't do it. It would also look better. That was one of the things I liked about Sweden. It was so much cleaner looking without all of the power lines.

 

I went and looked at a nearby power line setup. In addition to electricity lines, there are cable and telephone lines using the same pole system. There is a fence on one side and road on the other. The grassy strip directly underneath the power lines that would be trenched in is maybe 3' wide at the most.

To replace the current setup with an underground system, it would entail the current system to be taken down in the immediate area being worked on. There would need to be coordination with the other companies (cable, phone) using the pole system so that everybody had the right people at the right time to handle the project.

Then remove the existing poles and trench for an underground system. Some of the current wiring might be usable in the underground setup, but some wouldn't. There would likely be some type of casing needed to put the various wires in and new connections to individual users would need to be fabricated. Since wires will be running underground, then there would be trenching needed to each individual user.

Areas that are heavy with sidewalks and other things impeding trenching would need some serious prep work before the trenching could proceed.

<B>
Who is going to pay for the labor and materials to replace the current setup with an underground system?</B>

 

I'm getting pissed.

My house has no power, but the neighbors across the street do.
My parents have no power, but their neighbors across the street do.
My workplace has no power, but the businesses across the street do.

Could you imagine if a cat 5 hit the coast and houston had to withstand cat 4 winds? that would be catastropic.

 

And the alternative is to keep replacing the same lines over and over again? I am not saying it would be easy or it would be a quick fix, but in the long run, it would be better for everyone. Because it will be a big task, we should not do it? Really?

The CEO of Centerpoint was on 740 yesterday saying that customers are can expect a pretty hefty increase next year due to all this anyway. So why not have a system in place that prevents this from happening again?

 

that sucks. Hang in there.

 

Maybe if we stopped paying billions of dollars a month on stupid wars we could actually use it on building a decent infrastructure here in the US.

 

The way I looked at it, I'm actually glad all we had to deal with was no power after seeing the devastation in Galveston and surrounding areas. After seeing those pictures, no power doesn't seem that bad. I actually saw people walking around outside and just living life. Usually nobody is outside except for a few kids.

 

I totally agree. Lines and power will be back up eventually. Galveston lost alot more than that.

 

Tom Tynan was on SportsRadio 610 yesterday and was asked about the possibilities of underground lines.

He said that it would be a MASSIVE undertaking and it would be virtually impossible both from a financial standpoint and trying to work around the 100 feet of concrete and infrastructure built underneath the lines.

He said, if you were starting a Utopian city from scratch, that sure underground wiring sounds great. But, Houston and the surrounding areas are WAY too far beyond being able to do such a thing.

 

FWIW, here is Entergy's take on the pros/cons of underground power lines:

http://www.entergy.com/global/gustav/ungergroundlines/Underground-lines.pdf

 

Back when I was a land planner working on the new subdivisions of Sugar Land,
it costs 10 times as much to put the utilities underground compared to power poles. Any cost over the power pole installation had to be paid by the developer. In most of the high end housing we went ahead and built it into the projected price of the lot and did it but it's pretty hard to justify on less expensive housing. You would never go back and retro-fit existing lines.

My dim memory says it cost something like $20 a lineal foot for new construction in like 1990. Multiply that by 10,000 miles.

 

I think it is time to take things underground similar to what they do in new areas now.

 

The majority of the cons against underground power lines was $$. They basically said the same thing 20 different ways.

 

How often does Centerpoint have a massive failure like the current situation? I don't recall the outage from Alicia (25 years ago) being this severe. The replacement of lines in my area over the years has been minimal because trees aren't abundant.

Those that have more frequent line and outage issues seem to have an abundance of trees that cause problems in bad weather. If the decision is made to replace the aboveground system only in areas with an abnormal amount of failures, then that will likely entail trenching in and around tree roots which will take longer and drive the cost even higher.

I realize that Centerpoint, Entergy etc will have to pass the costs of this <I>Event</I> to the consumer. To pass on the costs of a massive trenching project on top of the current <I>Event</I> cost won't be palatable to the consumer and would cause financial hardship for some.

What is the projected cost for replacing the current pole system with underground lines?

 

I live in that same area and I am very dissapointed after reading your post to know that darkness will last for that much more, but well what can we do.