Sydney on blackout watch, people told to close windows and doors, turn off non-essential

In the largest city in a country with 300 years of coal left, yesterday the government asked a few million people to pull down the blinds on a midsummers day, to turn off the pool pumps, and not run the dishwasher from 4 – 8pm if they could avoid it. It was 42 degrees C.

Remember the good old days when the nation could afford to run the air con? Here in metropolis Australia, some days it’s better to bunker down in a few dark rooms with the air con at survival mode.

Welcome to Renewable World. What’s wrong with all those solar panels? Between dust storms and bushfires and the hail in Canberra, possibly they are covered in dust or soot, or perhaps, holes.

Imagine how much productive brain power is being consumed. The whole nation (almost) is becoming involved in management of the hypercomplex random generation network. As well as all those poles and wires and control rooms, we now need radio and twitter to send messages to the serfs to open and close windows, change their work schedules, or run out and click the pool pump off.

’Close your doors’: NSW’s power at capacity

Ben Graham, The […]