GET with It!
“Whoa! Look who’s getting a make-over!” Ima sniffed with a hint of jealousy. Ima Talltower was accustomed to being “Queen of the Hill” in the neighborhood. At 160 feet tall and supporting high-capacity electrical transmission lines, Ima and her sister Talltowers dominated the viewshed. But now she watched as Jess Ta’Woodpole, the older, lower voltage transmission line that paralleled her route, was getting re-strung with shiny, new electrical lines.
“Yep!” replied Jess, who never shied from confronting the brash Ima. “I’m getting re-conducted with cables made from state-of-the-art materials. Soon I’ll be almost doubling my current carrying capacity! Other countries have been using this stuff for years.
“Not only that, I heard the linemen say along with these new cables, the utility company is going to start using something they call grid-enhancing technologies (GET). GETs are low-cost, quick-to-deploy devices that can help me carry up to 40% more electricity.
“They said GET technology can do cool stuff like using real-time temperature and wind measurements to determine how much power can pass through my lines without overheating. And get this! They can also redirect power from congested lines to corridors that are less crowded. That way the electricity can be evenly distributed over the transmission network preventing overloads and increasing capacity.
“So,” Jess continued while standing just a little bit taller and a little bit straighter, “with my re-conducted cables and GET I’ll be more than doubling my carrying capacity, all at a tiny fraction of the cost and environmental fuss that went into creating you. I wonder what electricity ratepayers would think about that?”
“Wow, that’s very impressive!” acknowledged Ima in a not-so-haughty voice. “You’ll be transporting even more clean, reliable energy to folks without all the rigmarole it took to build me. Why doesn’t every utility company GET with it? Their ratepayers should demand that they do.
“Tell you what. I know I’ve been a bit of a show-off. Call a truce?” Ima asked. “Looks like the humans need us both.”
“Fair enough, but probably less of you and more of me,” Jess teased. “And imagine - if each family ramped up energy efficiencies and added rooftop solar where suitable, there’d be less need for both of us. The truth is we need everyone to pitch in to protect our only home because we’re all forever… Earthbound.”
“Whoa! Look who’s getting a make-over!” Ima sniffed with a hint of jealousy. Ima Talltower was accustomed to being “Queen of the Hill” in the neighborhood. At 160 feet tall and supporting high-capacity electrical transmission lines, Ima and her sister Talltowers dominated the viewshed. But now she watched as Jess Ta’Woodpole, the older, lower voltage transmission line that paralleled her route, was getting re-strung with shiny, new electrical lines.
“Yep!” replied Jess, who never shied from confronting the brash Ima. “I’m getting re-conducted with cables made from state-of-the-art materials. Soon I’ll be almost doubling my current carrying capacity! Other countries have been using this stuff for years.
“Not only that, I heard the linemen say along with these new cables, the utility company is going to start using something they call grid-enhancing technologies (GET). GETs are low-cost, quick-to-deploy devices that can help me carry up to 40% more electricity.
“They said GET technology can do cool stuff like using real-time temperature and wind measurements to determine how much power can pass through my lines without overheating. And get this! They can also redirect power from congested lines to corridors that are less crowded. That way the electricity can be evenly distributed over the transmission network preventing overloads and increasing capacity.
“So,” Jess continued while standing just a little bit taller and a little bit straighter, “with my re-conducted cables and GET I’ll be more than doubling my carrying capacity, all at a tiny fraction of the cost and environmental fuss that went into creating you. I wonder what electricity ratepayers would think about that?”
“Wow, that’s very impressive!” acknowledged Ima in a not-so-haughty voice. “You’ll be transporting even more clean, reliable energy to folks without all the rigmarole it took to build me. Why doesn’t every utility company GET with it? Their ratepayers should demand that they do.
“Tell you what. I know I’ve been a bit of a show-off. Call a truce?” Ima asked. “Looks like the humans need us both.”
“Fair enough, but probably less of you and more of me,” Jess teased. “And imagine - if each family ramped up energy efficiencies and added rooftop solar where suitable, there’d be less need for both of us. The truth is we need everyone to pitch in to protect our only home because we’re all forever… Earthbound.”
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