‘Extreme’ solar storm impacts NZ, power grid emergency declared
Sixteen electricity assets across the country have been removed from service to prevent power cuts: seven in the North Island and nine in the South Island, Transpower said. The notice was expected to remain in place until midday tomorrow.
Transpower said in a statement earlier: “As part of our contingency plan we are removing some transmission lines from service across the South Island as a precaution. In order to do this, we have to issue a grid emergency notice, however this initial action should not impact supply of electricity to consumers.”
Executive general manager John Clark told 1News the solar storm induced electrical currents through the Earth.
“Those electrical currents like to use our long transmission lines as an alternative route.”
The currents were “not good to have” through the grid so the flow of currents needed to be limited by turning off transmission circuits where possible, he said.
“This is a preemptive measure to make sure other more important equipment, namely transformers and generators, aren’t damaged.
“We’re able to supply everybody, but we haven’t got quite the same level of redundancy in the power system.”
The most recent event of similar or greater magnitude occurred in October 2003.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
