Spanish power failure

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Frequency collapse.

The basis of modern power generation is the alternator. AC is the most efficient method of transporting electrical energy (trust me, bro, or look up the history of the AC/DC wars if you want) and alternators naturally churn out AC. When you have a single generator and a single load it's a pretty easy thing to sort out - e.g. car alternator with the engine and auxiliary electrics being the load - an isolated system. What if you don't have enough power? The engine stops after the battery is drained. But you also have to consider excess power. In a car you can get away with using the battery as a sink. Nice and easy.

What if you have multiple generators and multiple loads? The grid system has been built up nationally and recently internationally over the last century. BTW we have an anniversary coming up with the Electricity (Supply) Act 1926. Anyhoo, what you need is all the generators to conform to the grid frequency and demand.

Grid Frequency is your pre-agreed 50 or 60Hz so however you want to do it the generator needs to not only spit out the same frequency it also has to have its Sine wave align with the rest of the grid (be in phase). Mechanically you can imagine some sort of gearing and braking system to dictate when and how fast the generator spins, tweak it until you line up the wavy bits (synchronise) with the rest of the grid and then flip the switch. Obviously now it's all done with copious maths and engineering: "this 10 tonne generator will conform to the grid specs if run at 3,000 rpm" and the whole alignment of phases is automated.

Tricky stuff! How about reacting to power demand? Actually this is much easier with field coil alternators. With permanent magnets the alternator output is dictated by size and RPMs. With a field coil alternator you replace the magnets with coils and the overall output is dictated by size, rpms and crucially how much power you syphon off to run the field coils. Effectively you have the ability to vary the strength of your magnets. Aha! So as demand rises we can excite the field coils more and as it drops, excite them less - a feedback loop. You can now picture banks of generators switched in and out and with varying field coil excitation (within the limits of the generator design).

How do you make the generators spin? Historically steam. Burn shit or irradiate shit, heat water, make a cuppa and drive a turbine. If we go back in history and think of a steam train, did the coal make the wheels move? Erm no, the steam reservoir was filled and bled off to the pistons on demand. In other words, steam generation offers us another control point we can use to react to rising and falling demand.

We have to balance frequency and demand on a national scale by fiddling with coils and generators and steam turbines and... and this all sounds rather fragile Indeed it is! Enter stage left:

https://i.giphy.com/7SQUBCye01UJVE8mk5.webp

Net Zero.

Solar power is DC, that's the nature of the panels. To feed into the grid they need an inverter that essentially has a nose around the prevailing grid frequency and simulates alternator output in a reactive manner. Output is probably more consistent and predictable in Spain than the UK but there isn't the inherent feedback loop and centralisation from having big power plants. Solar farms are small and scattered.

Wind power is worse. Output isn't as predictable as "it's night, bro, solar don't work". It is spinny, therefore you can make AC but the easy feedback loops of traditional power generation just aren't there. You can pretty much just switch the generators in and out and that's it.

The corruption starts small. A few solar and wind farms dump random amounts of power into the grid. The bigger power plants vary their output to compensate and balance the grid. But what happens when solar and wind takes over, becomes the majority. Traditional power plants that were the punching bag for Net Zero - both ideologically and in grid stability - are done away with, blown up with gleeful grins from the Climate Change evangelists. Who is in charge?

The race to Net Zero is a race to bring about Frequency Collapse. With no "Big Boy" power plants to dictate the Sine wave and flatten out the peaks and troughs of demand the traditional grid system fails. Catastrophically.

There's probably some crossover between Information Theory and electricity generation that could tell us how many unstable power generation sources you can introduce to a regulated system before it fails. Regardless, the Spanish seem to have given us a practical example.

Heading off grid failure requires a dominating reference source of Net Zero power generation. The odd thing is the Spanish already have this with extensive hydroelectric power (>13% of total output). Hydroelectric = spinny thing go round at predictable and adjustable speed. Grid management incompetence then? Somewhat understandable given the "red-headed step-child" nature of Hydro vs. Net Zero's natural born children, Solar and Wind
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[Polarbear]

TLDR: Big windmills are shit. (and look ugly)

In a microcosm of what you are talking about. On ships we had steam turbine alternators for base load with diesel generators that would cut in and out depending on required load. Also we had 50% redundancy to cover failures. Any system needs flexibility, controllable flexibility.

I'm a fan of nuclear but the tree huggers hate that almost as much as fossil fuel power. However they might have a change of heart if we get a blackout like the Iberian peninsular did, i mean, no mobile phones to social media your virtue signaling? Life wont be worth living.
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[Easy-X]

From the Telegraph:

Britain hit by unusual power activity hours before Spain blackout

tl;dr a couple systems feeding into the UK grid tripped out, possibly due to frequency discrepancies. (A power plant and the Danish continental grid connection.)

One thing in the article I missed out from my initial analysis: pricing. Not only do grids need to maintain frequency and demand stability, they also need to "import" power into the grid at the best possible price or export surplus power as an alternative to commanding generators to wind down.
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