Crisis
Once again, California was hit with rolling blackouts.

This came as a surprise to virtually everyone. When I woke up yesterday morning, there were no indications that CalISO was issuing any power alerts. It seemed like your typical March day, with the weather peaking around 75 degrees and the skies empty of clouds and the sun shining brilliantly. Then came the bad news.

It was around 12:30pm when I saw that there was a Stage 3 Power Emergency issued. (A Stage 3 Power Emergency means that the power reserves have dipped below 1.5%). A short time later, I receive a PhoneMail message stating that the building I am working in is on one of the scheduled blackout blocks. The power never did go out here, so we were lucky in that sense.

It seems like over the last few months, the only thing that people have been constantly talking about is the power. No longer do the lunchroom discussions focus on the housing market, the dot-com shakedown or the traffic in the area. Without fail, there is always some article in the newspaper talking about how this summer California is going to be in serious problems unless something is done quickly.

For a while, it seemed like the rolling blackout problem was only present here in Northern California. I’ve always wondered why it is that Southern California seemed immune to this “solution”. I knew that Los Angeles has their own power municipality, so they didn’t have to rely on the state power grid. But what about San Diego, Orange County and all of the other areas on Southern California? Well, I still don’t know the answer to that, but yesterday they did experience rolling blackouts for the first time. After all, yesterday’s emergency was really their fault.

Well, actually it was and it wasn’t their fault. The sudden drain on the grid was due to the unseasonably warm temperatures that were felt down in SoCal. People cranked up their air conditioners and added a burden to the already low supply. Couple that with a transformer fire, plant shutdowns due to maintainance and repair and it was the formula for disaster. So, the blame could really be placed on Mother Nature. Or should it be diverted elsewhere? It seems like everyone wants to blame it on someone other than themselves. After all, how could the light I left on in my house break the system?

No matter how hard I try, I can’t escape it. It is the front page story today in the Mercury News. It has even received national attention. My friends always seem surprised to see that I’m still online and always preface a conversation with, “you still have power?” Even our buddies on the other side of the pond are watching what happens here very carefully. After all, this could happen to anyone.

Some people say that there is always a silver lining to all adversity. Some people, as mentioned in the CNN article, hope that this sends a message stating to stay away from California. I personally don’t see that happening.

So today, California hopes avoid more blackouts. At least this was what was said earlier this morning. Now the headline reads something like California orders blackouts… Wonderful. So again, I must assume that the power will be cut to this building at some point this morning/afternoon. This post has been saved many, many times in case suddenly everything goes black.

But there is one good thing though. If the power goes out, it’ll give me an excuse to run around outside, pretend that I’m 8 years old again and enjoy the wonderful weather.