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CNN Live Today

Power Blackout

Aired August 18, 2003 - 10:17   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: More on last week's massive power outage here with a closer look what went wrong through the eyes of an expert. Clark Gellings is a vice president of power delivery and utilization at the Electric Power Research Institute. He joins us this morning from New York.
Thanks for coming in and talking with us. Again, Clark, last week, we talked with you, you were out in California. Are you in New York because of the blackout?

CLARK GELLINGS, ELECTRIC POWER RESEARCH INST.: I'm visiting with some power companies here, talking about some of the issues surrounding the blackout, yes.

HARRIS: Can you share anything with us, anything that you may have talked with anybody there about?

GELLINGS: I don't think there's anything particular to New York. I think the concern that we have in the power industry now is that we know more or less where it started. We don't know the exact cause yet. That will be some weeks. But why was it so massive? Why didn't systems isolate themselves more?

HARRIS: And you know what, as you ask that question, I'm hearing plenty of people around the country saying how is it that four lines in Ohio could have caused such a massive and widespread blackout. Is there any clue at this particular point?

GELLINGS: Only speculation really, talk about relay settings and the like, and alarms not sounding. It is, after all, a mechanical system, a rather dumb system, '50s technology. We need to think about modernizing it.

HARRIS: How about the people who were in charge here? Because it seems as though this was not a day -- speaking of last Thursday, was not a day where there was any sort of unusual demands made on the system that I'm aware of. The weather wasn't so terribly bad there would be a huge change in the level of demand on the system from one day to the next. So is it possible it could have been the people actually managing the system that might be a problem here?

GELLINGS: We don't know whether it was human error, and/or controls, and/or relay settings, or some combination of all of those things. It could be more than one event, and we can't conclude at this moment that we can blame any one company or any one system operator. HARRIS: Well, this loop, this so-called Lake Erie Loop that is where they believe at some point around the system which is where we had the outage there on those four lines that caused the cascade, one of the things that I'm hearing is that there's a different set of standards, if you will, for the way this system is managed versus the way other systems around the country are managed as well.

And there are some who are saying that that difference of management there, those standards differences may be what led this outage blacking out this particular part of the country, while other parts of the country, can say for instance, New England, with their standards, it didn't happen there. Doesn't this mean then that there's going to be a call at some point to modernize and to standardize all standards for all systems across the country?

GELLINGS: Well, it is true that the compliance at this point for reliability is a voluntary set of compliances, and there is good reason to discuss making that mandatory.

HARRIS: Do you think now is the time?

GELLINGS: I think now is the time to raise the issue. I think it's also time to start looking at the power delivery system we have in the United States and really getting serious about both upgrading it, modernizing it. Most every industry in this country has revolutionized itself through the use of communications, sensors and computational ability, except the U.S. power industry.

HARRIS: Not just the U.S. involved here, also Canada, and blackouts involved up there, as well. I'm hearing now that officials in Ottawa are saying that they don't want anyone to use 25 to 50 percent of their normal power for the next couple of days, not just for getting the system back online, but for a while back into the process. Are you concerned perhaps if people in Ontario don't follow those instructions, there might it be another cascade of blackouts that would still affect the U.S.

GELLINGS: I think we're watching things pretty closely at the moment. I'm not concerned today. I'm concerned in the long run though, not just for East, or the Northeast, but really for the nation. This isn't the only point of stress that we have in the power delivery system.

HARRIS: Where do you think the next critical point of stress may be that may force people to pay attention?

GELLINGS: You know, we can't really brag about California being OK. California is still under stress. Texas has some points of stress. There's other places in the East that are stressful. You know, we ought to be really glad. I'm really glad that the economy isn't as hot as it was, or we'd be in real trouble.

HARRIS: Really? You think so?

GELLINGS: I do. HARRIS: Very interesting. Clark Gellings, we sure appreciate the insight once again. Perhaps we'll get a chance to talk about some more of this if more comes information out in the investigations.

Take care.

GELLINGS: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired August 18, 2003 - 10:17   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: More on last week's massive power outage here with a closer look what went wrong through the eyes of an expert. Clark Gellings is a vice president of power delivery and utilization at the Electric Power Research Institute. He joins us this morning from New York.
Thanks for coming in and talking with us. Again, Clark, last week, we talked with you, you were out in California. Are you in New York because of the blackout?

CLARK GELLINGS, ELECTRIC POWER RESEARCH INST.: I'm visiting with some power companies here, talking about some of the issues surrounding the blackout, yes.

HARRIS: Can you share anything with us, anything that you may have talked with anybody there about?

GELLINGS: I don't think there's anything particular to New York. I think the concern that we have in the power industry now is that we know more or less where it started. We don't know the exact cause yet. That will be some weeks. But why was it so massive? Why didn't systems isolate themselves more?

HARRIS: And you know what, as you ask that question, I'm hearing plenty of people around the country saying how is it that four lines in Ohio could have caused such a massive and widespread blackout. Is there any clue at this particular point?

GELLINGS: Only speculation really, talk about relay settings and the like, and alarms not sounding. It is, after all, a mechanical system, a rather dumb system, '50s technology. We need to think about modernizing it.

HARRIS: How about the people who were in charge here? Because it seems as though this was not a day -- speaking of last Thursday, was not a day where there was any sort of unusual demands made on the system that I'm aware of. The weather wasn't so terribly bad there would be a huge change in the level of demand on the system from one day to the next. So is it possible it could have been the people actually managing the system that might be a problem here?

GELLINGS: We don't know whether it was human error, and/or controls, and/or relay settings, or some combination of all of those things. It could be more than one event, and we can't conclude at this moment that we can blame any one company or any one system operator. HARRIS: Well, this loop, this so-called Lake Erie Loop that is where they believe at some point around the system which is where we had the outage there on those four lines that caused the cascade, one of the things that I'm hearing is that there's a different set of standards, if you will, for the way this system is managed versus the way other systems around the country are managed as well.

And there are some who are saying that that difference of management there, those standards differences may be what led this outage blacking out this particular part of the country, while other parts of the country, can say for instance, New England, with their standards, it didn't happen there. Doesn't this mean then that there's going to be a call at some point to modernize and to standardize all standards for all systems across the country?

GELLINGS: Well, it is true that the compliance at this point for reliability is a voluntary set of compliances, and there is good reason to discuss making that mandatory.

HARRIS: Do you think now is the time?

GELLINGS: I think now is the time to raise the issue. I think it's also time to start looking at the power delivery system we have in the United States and really getting serious about both upgrading it, modernizing it. Most every industry in this country has revolutionized itself through the use of communications, sensors and computational ability, except the U.S. power industry.

HARRIS: Not just the U.S. involved here, also Canada, and blackouts involved up there, as well. I'm hearing now that officials in Ottawa are saying that they don't want anyone to use 25 to 50 percent of their normal power for the next couple of days, not just for getting the system back online, but for a while back into the process. Are you concerned perhaps if people in Ontario don't follow those instructions, there might it be another cascade of blackouts that would still affect the U.S.

GELLINGS: I think we're watching things pretty closely at the moment. I'm not concerned today. I'm concerned in the long run though, not just for East, or the Northeast, but really for the nation. This isn't the only point of stress that we have in the power delivery system.

HARRIS: Where do you think the next critical point of stress may be that may force people to pay attention?

GELLINGS: You know, we can't really brag about California being OK. California is still under stress. Texas has some points of stress. There's other places in the East that are stressful. You know, we ought to be really glad. I'm really glad that the economy isn't as hot as it was, or we'd be in real trouble.

HARRIS: Really? You think so?

GELLINGS: I do. HARRIS: Very interesting. Clark Gellings, we sure appreciate the insight once again. Perhaps we'll get a chance to talk about some more of this if more comes information out in the investigations.

Take care.

GELLINGS: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com