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Old 11-09-13, 09:23 AM   #4
Robaroni
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Personally I think it's an historical transition. If you plot how the grid started you'll see that was a transition too.
The industrial revolution was limited by where it could get energy from. The steam engine took over from streams and water wheels but the steam engine had a nasty habit of blowing up.
When Nicola Tesla invented the AC motor the world changed and the fight between Edison's DC grid and Westinghouse's AC grid was over because, along with the AC motor, AC could also be induced and that enabled it to be stepped up or down. Edison was finished!

The grid has several major flaws. First it is vulnerable to large scale failures, like we saw when a relay in Canada failed and the East Coast of the US went dark and of course there's terrorism. When the grid goes down the ability to pump fuel goes down, so we have a snowball rolling down hill.

We have relinquished so much of our lives to corporate machines that they now control us. We buy our food from a market, oil energy from a gas pump, our health from the pharmaceutical industry and the power to run our homes from a monopoly. When that happens we become prey and are controlled completely. How many of you remember the gas shortage of the mid 70's?

The logical solution for individuals is to divest from that control as much as possible and the way to do that is with autonomy.
When you put in an intertie system, you make the power and you personally get the benefit. Even better, the grid is stronger and less susceptible to single event catastrophes.

I'm happy to see anyone producing their own power to whatever degree, we all benefit.

Rob
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