Politicians pledge power grid fix

[dArKeR]

ALTHOUTH THE NATION’S worst blackout has put energy back on Congress’ radar, regional conflicts, the controversy over electricity industry deregulation and concern about a power struggle between state regulators and those in Washington are among the issues that could sidetrack whatever might be needed to insulate the power system from future failures.
       When Congress returns from its summer recess next month, it is expected to embrace actions that will require utilities to comply with tougher reliability standards, and faced sanctions if they do not.
       There is strong bipartisan support for ending the industry’s current freedom to accept such standards voluntarily.

(How did they get this freedom in the first place?)

The North American Electric Reliability Council, which is leading the investigation, said early evidence suggested that the failure that triggered the “cascading” outages occurred in Ohio.
       But officials of the utilty that owns the high-voltage lines at the center of the probe said Sunday that there were numerous unusual power swings elsewhere in the Midwest hours before the lines failed.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/297115.asp?0cb=-21f173867

Absolutely no idea but we know it's not terrorism. And the reporter asks, 'how do you know it wasn't terrorism?'

http://darker0darker.tripod.com/

[Drifter]

1. Closing the barn door after the horse is gone ...

Just another example brought to you by the Republicans.

Meanwhile, the folks who have been pushing to allocate funds for Energy Grid updates (Democrats), will not get credit for saving the day (like the republicans will claim they have done).

Cheers
Drifter

[rock]

2. You press a button

We react. What a job.

[Old and In the Way]

3. Nice thing about electrical blackouts.

They are apolitical. I'm sure our Republican friends don't mind stumbling around in the dark to preserve their God given right to utility privitization.

[trogdor]

4. The #2 guy at Energy was on Wash. Journal this AM.

Blaming Congress for not having passed mandatory reliablity standards in 2001. What he wasn't telling anybody was, the bills were loaded to the gills with special interest garbage like ANWR drilling that guaranteed it wouldn't pass. Did *, Biggus Dickus, or anybody at Energy complain then? Hell no. Did they suggest they pull out the reliability stuff into a separate bill and pass it? Hell no; that would make the special interest garbage harder to pass. Is the next elecricity reliability bill likely NOT TO contain the same special interest garbage? Do I really have to answer that?

[On the Road]

5. Yeah -- Everything's a Corporate Bailout

Allow the interstate grid to deteriorate due to lack of oversight. Privatize the industry to create disincentives to invest and no penalites for failure. Then when the inevitable failure occurs, offer billions in unecessary corporate handouts.

Is that the plan?