Why The Power Grid is Nearly IMPOSSIBLE to Run

The world’s going electric fast, and that means we need a rock-solid power grid. But a report from China shows that power outages could seriously mess with EV adoption. In this video, we're breaking down the wild engineering behind the power grid, how tricky it is to keep everything running smoothly, and what happens when it all goes dark.

Chapters
0:00 - Introduction
0:29 - What is the Power Grid
1:05 - The Two Types of Current
1:35 - Alternating Current Generator
2:45 - Why do we use AC and not DC
3:14 - AC Has A Major Challenge
6:01 - How The Grid is Managed
7:10 - How Do You Keep Supply And Demand Balanced?
8:23 - How Large is The Transmission System
9:54 - How The Grid Starts Backup After a Blackout

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》》》About Ricky 《《《
Ricky is a dynamic individual whose journey from mechanical engineering to software development reflects his passion for learning and resilience. A proud Berkeley graduate, Ricky spent years working on advanced aircraft for the Navy, sharpening his technical skills. Driven by curiosity, he taught himself software engineering, expanding his expertise into the digital world.

His love for knowledge and teaching inspired him to create a YouTube channel, where he shares well-researched, engaging content. Beyond his professional achievements, Ricky is a devoted father and husband, admired for his ability to balance career, family, and his passion for inspiring others.

Thanks for watching.

#PowerGrid #Electricity #Engineering #Electrification #EnergyCrisis #EVAdoption #Sustainability #RenewableEnergy #PowerOutages #Infrastructure #Technology #CleanEnergy #EnergyTransition #GridReliability #ACvsDC #ElectricalEngineering #TeslaVsEdison #EnergyInnovation #FutureOfEnergy #SmartGrid #ElectricVehicles #ClimateAction #GreenEnergy #EnergyEfficiency #EnergyTech #GridManagement #EnergySecurity #PowerGeneration #EnergyStorage #ElectrificationRevolution Outages expand in California, More power shutoffs, power cutoff

what we'll cover
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[michaelc.]

I’m an electrical engineer who spent nearly 20 years designing and operating many parts of the Western Interconnect (the U.S. lower 48 has three main grids: Eastern Interconnect, Western Interconnect, and the Texas ERCOT. And while the “grid” is very complex, there are many automatic relays that help maintain stability (frequency and voltage). Bulk power operators bring generation on, off, or raise/lower power output to maintain stability, yet there are millions of devices that can shed load when frequency and/or voltage get out of spec. I also spent 15 years working at the national laboratory (DOE EERE NREL) and supported the development of standards and codes that are critical for integrating distributed energy resources (DER) to the various grids. It’s definitely an extremely complex system, the Grid, and it’s highly unlikely that batteries and EVs can stabilize a stressed out electrical grid of any size or location. Some in the Green New Deal community are actively pushing for the elimination of anything that burns, which is, in my humble opinion and many others, dangerous as we cannot rapidly raise the use of electricity as would be required if you were to eliminate gas furnaces, stoves, gas peaked power plants, and all things petroleum. People need to listen to those who build and operate electrical systems as they do know a thing or two about these topics. Well shoot, I have too many things to do rather than writing responses here. Cheers.

[chrisconklin]

Historically the power grid is highly centralized and operated in real time. Power was generated in big power stations and that power flowed to substations and onto consumers. Renewable energy sources like wind and solar are intermittent. By charging batteries, power can be disturbed over time as needed. A decentralized power grid with independent battery storage is the future.

[junkerzn]

So... just to be clear, reactive power can be corrected for with a capacitor / inductor bank, and commercial businesses generally do (or have to), else they get charged a lot more. For residential, the reactive power is generally corrected at the substation. So reactive power actually isn't quite as bad as you indicate. There is some extra power loss, but not much, and most of it is corrected for before it ever makes it back to an actual generator.

For transmission lines, losses are certainly not "5-10%". Usually losses over transmission lines are less than 2%. Most of the losses occur elsewhere. The end-to-end (generator to consumer) average grid losses are usually less than 10% on the whole.

AC and DC transmission lines are both very efficient, with DC edging AC out... but only by a little in terms of absolute percentages. The main reason DC is used for long-distance transmission lines is simply one of cost. It is cheaper to run DC transmission lines for distances in excess of a few hundred miles, simple as that.

The problem AC has with long distance transmission lines is not so much due to losses, but instead due to phase. Beyond a certain distance dynamic phase correction is required because the transmission line expands and contracts with temperature and other weather conditions and otherwise could not be synchronized to the grid on the far end.

--

With regard to peaker plants and keeping the grid in balance, it is also not quite as difficult as you indicate. First of all, energized transmission lines themselves have a lot of momentum. The grid is never in perfect balance but all that means is that the voltage moves around a bit, usually depending on the time of day. I'm sure many people with kill-a-watt's have noticed this. Sometimes you will see 115V, sometimes 120V, sometimes 112V. This is because corrections cannot react to changes in load instantly. A NG plant can take 15-30 minutes to correct for a load imbalance, for example.

Base load sources generally output at 100%, or near to it, because they can't operate economically otherwise. So base load sources cannot really adapt to very fast-changing conditions (such as the California and Texas grids have). Peaker plants fill this role, but increasingly peaker plants are being removed in favor of grid scale storage. Battery storage is taking over because it can react to imbalances in seconds, even milliseconds.

In California, the massive discrepancies between supply and demand that occur in the short term during the evening ramp are handled almost universally by batteries now, and not peaker plants.

-Matt

[snoflite]

More videos like this one please. The grid is a very interesting topic and the tech is changing with wind and solar growing and battery storage.

[Roy_Godiksen]

So much we take for granted. The power grid, water grid, internet, and the sewer system is only the few most obvious. A lot can go wrong in our fragile society.

[Phil_AKA_ThundyUK]

What amazes me most of all is how there's no plans built in for when the Earth is inevitably hit by a solar flare like the Carrington Event. It's a certainty it will happen and it's likely an extinction event but no one bothers to harden their grids against it. We had a near miss only a few years ago, the event missing Earth by mere minutes.

[GregFurtman]

Another great video. And I would definitely watch the two suggested videos you'd make.

[robertcoffin]

Yes please! I would like to hear more about this subject. I would also be interested in videos about why AC won out over DC, I heard years ago that it had something to do with having to have a substation at the end of every block where AC could go farther distances. I now question that information since you just said in this video that they are using DC for long distance HV lines now, why not back then? Additionally, are there any plans of DC neighborhoods being developed that don't use AC at all. It would also be interesting to know if DC has better future proofing, like if a DC infrastructure would function better during solar flares, terrorist attacks, or EMP. I've always thought it would be beneficial to put in DC lights in my house along with solar panels to avoid the conversion losses when going from DC to AC, although I admit it would be minimal in savings.

[mvb]

if the power grid cannot keep up - the requirement for more de-centralized power generation and power storage will increase! if you ask me if all the ev cars are bidirectional and tied to the grid, i think that we can solve 90% of the issue! even more we will get more grid stability!

[rushednr]

Wait What?!?! So Edison was right to electrocute that elephant with AC power? DC being MORE efficient in transmitting power over long distances goes against every story I've ever heard told about the Tesla v Edison rivalry. Thought DC lines had to be super cooled with nitrogen or something. Please explain.

[martinfarfsing]

Another great video, black start-ups also is of concern on large boats and ships . It will all be worked out in the end .

[andyfeimsternfei]

I've been in the industry for over 40 years. It has always amazed me that the lights stay on, and I know how it works. In today's grid, I'm not sure it will much longer!

[picobyte]

With the use of our huge heavy gas, coal and nuclear turbines we keep inertia in our grid. Wind, solar and batteries can't compete with these.
When there is someting shorting or huge load gets dropped it's our huge baseload stations taking up that unbalance in their rotating mass.

[JoePolaris]

There’s a the point if our line lines, which you pointed out, re-cabling lines, our line are old, without reinstalling distribution towers, we stand to eliminate 40% of loss, just with new cables. Great episode Ricky, you covered all the angles, love it

[robincross]

As a retired broadcast engineer, I usually watch videos and see what errors they make. Congratulations!!! I didn't see or hear any, A very good explanation tailored to the generally average citizen.

[davepetro]

And a lot of people are not taken jobs to keeping the grid going. If keep at this pace there be no one to keep it going in years ahead

[DMoz]

I want to know more about DC power, and how hard it is to introduce wind and solar power into the system. Sounds fascinating!

[ShawnHCorey]

When things go wrong, chaos does not happen. What happens is the grid shuts down. It is designed to do this to prevent further damage.

This is what happened in the northeast blackout of 1965. One power plant became overloaded. It's circuit breakers opened to prevent damage to the power plant and it went offline. But then the load distributed to other power pants, which overloaded them, which went off line to prevent damage. Within minutes, the whole northeast US and parts of Ontario and Québec were blacked out. It was not chaos. It was a controlled shutdown to prevent damage to the power plants.

BTW, this is unlikely to happen again since substations, which distribute power to the neighbourhoods, now have power regulators. They prevent the substation from drawing too much power from the grid. Customers downstream may suffer brownouts and blackouts but the grid continues to function.

[sharonscott]

As an Electronic tech, as opposed to Electrical tech, I understand the varying drawing of power loads. I also learned that if the different sources are out of phase / sync with each other it can cause problems in combining them. So keeping the various plants on 60 cycles is important. I would like to hear about how they keep all the plants in phase/sync. So that when multiple plants feed the grid there is minimal losses.

[markbooth]

You might be interested to compare how the U.S power grid works, compared to the U.K. power grid. Here, we don't require power plants to match frequency, and let voltage vary, we allow the grid frequency to vary according to demand, keeping a fixed voltage.

We use the inertia in the system to smooth out power demands, where 'inertia' is literally the inertia of the spinning generators. If more energy is being pumped into the generators than the power grid is drawing, that extra energy goes into the inertia, resulting in faster spinning generators and higher frequency, if less energy is being pumped into the generators than the power grid is drawing, that shortfall comes from the inertia, resulting in slower spinning generators and lower frequency.

That way, fast changes in demand are dealt with more passively. This probably only works because our grid is smaller, but it's an interesting difference in approaches.