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isaac

@sevier.io

Posting about electricity and how we can care for one other. Building @publicgrids.org. SF. they.

Latest: “To fight oligarchy, build local democracy"
https://www.isaacsevier.com/notes/to-fight-oligarchy-build-local-democracy/

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isaac

@sevier.io

Balcony solar could essentially trick circuit breakers in US and overheat home circuits. The highest limit with best case scenario assumptions about home wiring quality and wear from this paper is 420W of plug in solar, far far below the 800-1000W I keep seeing used.

www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18...

2.2. Breaker Masking

Most U.S. plug-in DERs are designed for 120 V NEMA 5-15 receptacles, which are often connected in parallel on non-dedicated circuits. Backfeeding onto non-dedicated circuits can cause a technical issue known as breaker masking, where the current on a circuit can exceed the rating of the circuit's breaker. Breakers are designed to trip above a rated current as seen at the panel. When only loads are present, the breaker current is the sum of the load currents. However, plug-in DERs can effectively cancel out load current as seen by the breaker. Figure 6 illustrates a worst-case scenario, where two 14 A hair dryers operate on a 20 A circuit. In this case, 28 A flows through a section of the circuit, rapidly overheating the wire. The breaker only detects 18 A and will not trip.

Figure 6. An illustration of the breaker masking problem.
Here, the breaker does not trip despite there being 28 A on a section of the 20 A circuit.

Not all circuit configurations are problematic. As shown in Figure 7, plug-in DERs at the end of a circuit may be safe.
However, we cannot expect occupants to have knowledge of their home's internal wiring.

January 10, 2026 at 12:39 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

quoted post said: "are you intentionally ruining the conversation by reposting every time instead of replying?"

January 9, 2026 at 7:50 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

one of the most absurd things - magical, whimsical, insane - about san francisco has got to be letting people build houses on Harry Street. imagine living in a little cottage off this rickety set of wooden stairs for the cool price of $1.4 million.

www.zillow.com/homedetails/...

a wet wooden staircase on a steep hill filled with plants and trees

January 8, 2026 at 4:36 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

Magnolia blooms are here

A magnolia tree budding with one deep scarlet flower, not yet open in front of San Francisco Victorian row houses

January 7, 2026 at 10:45 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Looks cool

Photo of the Powell and Hyde cable car

ON VIEW JANUARY 15, 2026 TO JUNE 18, 2026
EXHIBITION
Moving San Francisco
Views from the SMTA Photo Archive
1903 - Now

January 7, 2026 at 12:26 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

We made hotpot for a NYE party and while shopping in Chinatown I made possibly one of the best discoveries of my life. 10/10 recommend these insanely good, chewy, wide instant noodles.

January 6, 2026 at 6:53 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Goodbye Mendocino coast ✌️

California coast bluffs with a wave spraying high

January 4, 2026 at 8:58 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Corporations like PG&E have run the grid for over a hundred years and today every blackout, every wildfire they spark, every pole that falls over when a light breeze blows, is because they are designed to do one thing: control the public so their shareholders win above everybody else.

Page from "POWER PLAY"

P. 58
For example, the State Federation of Labor had been an early proponent of the act. However, someone was employed to visit all the union papers and persuade them to change their stance. A prominent labour man, a former president of the Building Trades Council of San Francisco, P. H. McCarthy, was also hired and paid a large sum of money to be used at his discretion to influence the unions. The federation changed its position.

The utilities influenced many organisations by providing their most influential members, those "with standing and reputation as distinguished members commanding the confidence of their fellows" , with expense accounts in return for getting their organisation to endorse the utility view-point." A government committee reported in 1923:

Another practice, shown by the testimony to have been extensively resorted to in the campaign and calculated to work deception on the voter, was that of employing as campaign workers, persons prominent in commercial bodies, farm organi-zations, labor unions, social literary, and civic clubs, without these hired representatives disclosing their employment. In this way members of organizations were kept in the dark as to the real motive of fellow members who were apparently disinterested in their views.

...

Where organisations had voted to support the measure the campaign attempted to get it put to the vote again and stacked the new meeting by sending cars for people and persuading them individually of the case against it. In some cases, such as the North Beach Improvement Club, their strategy succeeded and groups reversed their position.

The banks, insurance companies, and bond houses all sent out circulars and letters to their customers opposing the measure. The president of PG&E explained how the banks helped by sending "out hundreds of thousands of personal letters and pieces of literature to their depositors and stockholders, as well as campaigning against it personally."

December 23, 2025 at 2:35 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

I’ve spent the past year speaking to people in the utility industry, attending its conferences, and sounding out its critics. What I’ve found is that beneath the sector’s undeniable need for new and upgraded infrastructure lies a deeper problem concerning how the industry makes its money. When utilities earn substantial profits, one might expect customers to see some relief in their monthly bills. But as a result of the ownership model of the utilities that serve most Americans, this is rarely what happens. Rather, utilities earn substantial profits because regulators allow them to require ordinary people to pay more. Far from responding to an affordability crisis, electric utilities are helping to create it.

December 18, 2025 at 5:17 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

The set up for blowtorching your sense of taste

The set up for making a chile sauce- fried onions, chiles, peanuts, sesame seeds, and oil

December 13, 2025 at 7:42 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Making a new recipe where one step is to just do this 🤤

A pan of butter and whole garlic cloves sautéing together

December 13, 2025 at 2:28 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

Austerity for everything but the lighting budget I guess

City hall light up with high powered projectors that try to make it look like the building is covered in Christmas decorations.

December 13, 2025 at 1:30 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

Hey

My cat Indy. A white cat with heterochromia sitting on a chair with his paws tucked in. He's looking up at the camera and his eyes are brightly lit by the room's warm light sources.

December 12, 2025 at 2:06 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

One way of thinking about why people feel the issue of energy bills so much-- it's the money they would have spent on having fun, clothes, shoes, and most Americans most sacred possessions, cars.

Changes in Monthly Consumer Spending, September 2025

(this is a chart of the Personal Consumption Expenditure index components)

Shows gasoline & energy goods increasing by $17.2 billion; several categories including Food, Recreation, Durable Goods, Clothing and footwear, Recreational goods, and Motor vehicles all having decreased spending. Roughly equal to the increase in energy. (around $20 billion decrease across all categories)

December 11, 2025 at 7:07 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Here's the newspaper on the last day of the session in which the Georgia legislature established the railroad commission in 1907 (which would include the electricity system later bc the railway companies were the electric light companies)

Source: gahistoricnewspapers.galileo.usg.edu/lccn/sn89053...

December 11, 2025 at 1:37 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

well obviously

December 6, 2025 at 1:38 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

This is basically the endpoint of all of this discussion about flex loads -- so it's pretty funny to me that rather than an extremely decisive "yes this is a great idea, do it now!" conclusion, the actual end state makes "further analysis required" because the models used can't do it.

Adding all 6 data centers (at 700 MW nameplate) at the same time leads to complex outcomes → further analysis required

Overall curtailment increases, particularly for the most constrained site(s), likely due to transmission congestion being contained to a small number of lines. This highlights both the importance of continued transmission upgrades for the most constrained lines and the need to study large load additions in correct sequence (clustered or one-at-a-time). It's unlikely all six of these data centers would interconnect at the same time, in the same region, but it would clearly increase the size of on-site resources required to manage network constraints.

December 6, 2025 at 12:55 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

The results being publicly available is expected, of course. But why should anyone believe a model (1) from a non-grid operator (2) about really detailed technical aspects of running the grid hour by hour (3) funded by the industry player demanding the change the report recommends?

Google funded this study & reviewed the analysis prior to publication

December 5, 2025 at 11:57 PM

isaac

@sevier.io

Sleepy and indignant

December 4, 2025 at 5:04 AM

isaac

@sevier.io

"Of the 473 commissioners for whom Heern could find information on what they did after they left utility regulation, 50% of them went to work for one of the industries they regulated, or in an industry-adjacent role such as consulting."

Here's Sammy Roth in 2023: archive.is/1TIJR#select...