this post was submitted on 22 Jan 2024
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I worked for an electric utility for nearly 2 decades and now am a consultant helping power companies with grid modernization. This is the part that terrifies me, we are WOEFULLY unprepared for an event like this. A number of times over the years a strategic transformer reserve has been floated to congress with no movement. Even things like a large scale, coordinated attack against a bunch of substations at once could cripple the US power grid for months or even years. Transformer lead-times can be as long at 70 weeks last I knew. Obviously, in the event of a large-scale event the government could step in and throw resources to speed that up but it would be FAR better to have a ready-to-go supply we could draw from.
what i wonder is this something that can be solved without government long range wisdom? like could you start a business stockpiling these things and being the only game in town when theres a disaster? or are the disasters so rare and the price gouging so limited that it would be a bad business move to sit on a square mile of these somewhere inexpensive and safe?
Great question, and I should have probably clarified my response. There are transformers, the "cans" you see on utility poles. Then there are transformers, the "big boys" in substations. This is one of the better pics I can find on Google, oddly enough it links to an article about how easy it is to disable a substation by shooting out the transformer: https://stopfossilfuels.org/electric-grid/shooting-transformers-disables-substations/buckskin-substation-transformer-shooting.jpg
The cans you see on poles are relatively ubiquitous and fairly easy to source. The big boys in the substations are the ones with the huge lead times and large cost. Stockpiling them as a business would be a loosing venture. It would be unlikely you would have a customer locally and transporting them is expensive owing to the weight/size.
As someone who works for a large utility company on the distribution side, the small ones on poles or in underground neighborhoods are still tough to get with backorders causing delays in projects. It’s gotten a lot better, but it’s still slow on them.