Brittle Power- PARTS 1-3 (+Notes) - Natural Capitalism Solutions

Chapter Six: Picking Up the Pieces 61ty-three thousand person-days, for example, for a seriously damaged boiler.Most major repairs require not only small tools and welders but also heavycranes and hoists. Transporting heavy items like generator rotors and transformersis an exacting task when transport systems are working normally. Inthe event of widespread disruption, it could prove impossible. Such items aslarge transformers, for which spares are often too costly to keep, must nowadaysbe returned to the manufacturer for many of the repairs that might beneeded. Cannibalizing existing equipment is seldom feasible, because“Interchangeability of major equipment is generally not possible due to severematching problems. Thus, repair or replacement of such components willpose a major post-[nuclear-] attack problem.” 9Another estimate 10 suggests that a minimum of several weeks would beneeded to restore a modestly damaged power station to operation under idealconditions, including absolute availability of expertise, labor, money, andparts, no radiation or other interfering conditions, and no conflicting priorities.The history of even minor repairs in high-radiation-field areas of nuclearplants suggests that it would not take much radiological or chemical contaminationto complicate repairs enormously and even to exhaust available poolsof skilled workers: some welds have required hundreds of welders over a periodof months, each exposed to the quarterly limit in just a few minutes’ work.For some types of repairs to damaged energy systems, national manufacturingcapacity is already strained to keep up with routine demand, let alonethe exigencies of large-scale emergency repairs. Large tubular steel is an obviousexample. Pipe over about twelve inches in diameter is normally specialordered,as are the large motors and other special components associated withit. 11 If Mideast oil systems suffered major pipe damage, digging up existingU.S. pipelines, cutting them into sections, flying them to the stricken area, andrewelding them might be faster than manufacturing new pipe.In such an emergency, needs for equipment and trained personnel, too,would dwarf any standby capacity—as was arguably the case when during theThree Mile Island accident, industry experts from around the world convergedon Middletown. Automation has so reduced the number of fieldemployees in the oil and gas industry “that the system could not suddenlyrevert to hand operation.” Since most company repair crews have been disbandedin favor of specialized contractor crews, “Should a number of areas bedamaged at once, they could not be repaired in any suitable time to serve anemergency.” 12 Recovery from limited damage is hard enough; damage to, say,several refineries in the same area would be “a catastrophe”; damage to manythroughout the country would be virtually unrepairable because of the shortageof skills and parts. 13