• spikespaz@programming.dev
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    2 months ago

    But I don’t understand why them being connected makes one dependent on the other, unless half of the supply alone can’t support the workload. What is the “electrical utility level”

    • gaiussabinus@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Both substations feed in parallel. Demand exceeded the capacity of station 2 to supply demand and it tripped the cutout. Only rural connections are radial. Electrical utility starts at the point of demarcation to the generators that make the power.

    • SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social
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      2 months ago

      The “utility level” is Madison Gas & Electric’s infrastructure. Our ISP had two independent electrical service connections based on the idea that if one went down, they’d still get power sufficient to run their data center from the other. That would be the case if each connection reached all the way to the generating station completely independently. However, the two substations to which the ISP was connected were linked in such a way that a catastrophic failure of one caused failure of the other, so it got no electrical power.