The US electrical grid is in desperate need of upgrades, watchdog warns

We've only been saying this for 20 years, what's another 20?

Record profits for shareholders could have been applied elsewhere, like investing in ourselves and what keeps the gears of society turning.

Of course it is.

We have more energy consuming stuff than ever. But do you ever see NEW substations being built? NEW long range power lines? I don't.

Around here, the utility has a deal- they will sell you a top of the line $400 color touchscreen WiFi thermostat that talks to Alexa and displays the weather report and does a bunch of other shit, for $10 (not a typo). In exchange, you let them remotely shut off your AC if the grid gets overloaded.

Why do they do this? Because a few truckloads of thermostats (with a bulk discount) are a fuckton cheaper than actually upgrading the grid.

And so we hear about grid overload days and possible brownouts and incentives to shut stuff off as if this is the way it's supposed to be. But the reality is these problems only exist because utilities don't keep ahead of necessary upgrades. After all, why spend the money when there's shareholders to answer to?

Texas leads the way.

I'm at this point pretty convinced that the US is like your friend in high school that never changed the oil in his car because it still started and ran, until of course it didn't.

Good thing the grid is run by private corporations that always do timely maintenance. Oh wait...

Nationalise utilities. But the GOP would just attack them when they are in power. Fucken hate the clown show. Maintenance is bad all over this fucking country cause everyone gets so butthurt they can't pinch those pennies into their own accounts. Its fucken maddening I hope the whole bitch falls apart just so I can rub the ashes in their faces.

Even if we exclude Texas?

I vaguely remember a TV movie from like... 2006 where some kind of solar storm /coronal mass ejection thing happens right as some hacker was trying to "HEY EVERYONE THIS SYSTEM IS VULNERABLE AND YOU SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT BEFORE A BAD GUY TAKES CONTROL" type hack of the electrical grid, and the combination of the hack and solar radiation causing most of the US power grid to shut down

I haven't seen anything in real life to convince me the power gris isn't a prince ruperts drop that only works because it's never been shut down all at once before, and once it does that tail shatters and takes the rest with it.

In fact, living near a power substation that supplies a couple major things for a nearby city, I'm convinced the only reason there hasn't been a massive attack against it is because people just assume it's well protected.

I've had 2 multiple day power outages in the Milwaukee area, and 4 or 5 shorter ones over the past few years. It literally never used to happen.

ya think? you know there are countries where blackouts are a rare thing, not a routine occurrence....