TK posted:VVP posted:The report itself recognize that there are periods of dry spell where Amaila cannot operate at full capacity. At one point it said that the operation is more like a run of river type (which seems to me like there is not sufficient reservoir capability). This means they would still have to carry backup generation to serve the load. If Amaila cannot generate for lack of water flow they will have to have total load backup. So if there is not sufficient backup there could be blackout.
No blackouts cannot be guaranteed, even in the USA where massive amounts are spent on reliability. The loss of a transmission tower could result in blackout under the Amaila construct. Gotta run.
I only experienced ONE blackout in the US in 15 years. So, would this hydro put us in a situation of one blackout every 15 years? I would take that any day.
Living in Florida and only 1 blackout! Lucky you. My Generac saves the day at least once a year for me, but I live in farm country so no big deal.
You cannot compare Guyana with the USA. In NY, for example, we can lose our largest nuclear plant at 1,300 MW (one unit with output about 8 times the size of Amalia!) an you will not get a blackout because there is excess "generating/operating reserves" carried at all times to pick up the loss. There is mega investment on reliability in the USA.
In 2003 there was a major blackout due to a problem in Ohio that caused a "system collapse" that cascaded throughout the Northeast. NY lost over $1B in productivity for that incident.
Guyana has major reliability problems. It's not only generation problems but transmission and distribution problems. Minor incidents cause major collapses in Guyana. In the USA heads will roll for those thing. I think they need to do proper modeling of the electric system in Guyana and look into their system protection. You can have all the generation in the world, but if you have a weak transmission and distribution system you will have major problems.