Who all works in the power industry???

I hear you, brother! In Ohio, electric generation is de-regulated. We generate when the market dictates. We do generate some when we get caught in low market times also. During the past two months, we ran hard and mostly full load, because of the extreme cold. Mothership made huge $$$$$$$$$$, but those times are far and few. Generally speaking, here we make our big $$$ in Jan and Feb, and from mid July to mid September for air conditioning. I know you are exactly right in what you say about NG pricing. As soon as they kill off enough coal plants, electricity will soar in price, as if it hasn't already. Here in Ohio, power is still relatively cheap due to coal.
Our turbines are huge and rugged and will run months at a time often without coming out. But with deregulation now, we are out more than running.
For my case, it is a good time to be near retirement age. Really sucks for the young folks though with house payments, car payments and kids in school, etc. Used to enjoy the job, but now there is far too much drama and bullshit to deal through.

 

Our coal plant used activated carbon injection prior to our baghouse and absorbers took care of all the mercury regs.

 

Thanks for the shout out ha ha. Ya it's been a great career for me so far I'm only 30 years old and already have 9 years in the industry. I do believe the future of generation is going to change some. There is a group here in Az building a 65 MW, solar field that will charge a battery that can hold 50 MW of generation. Our company bought the contract and plans to use it during peak hours. My company is also building 5 new LMS 100s combustion turbines to answer to fluctuations in solar and wind turbine MWs. There is a tremendous amount of solar in az now but it is super unstable one cloud passing by can really cause a swing. Also I have some experience with Californias energy imbalance market you can check it out at Caiso.com During the evening and morning peaks we will MW selling for $1000.00 per MW hour.

 

We use activated carbon also, along with hydrated lime and anhydrous ammonia (reason why we have armed guards). We recently installed a new system that mixes kiln dust and something else (can’t remember the name) to reduce N0x.

Do you by chance work for Dynergy?
Down in Texas NG dictates power prices because we have so much of it, average price is around $20/MW right now.

 

Sandy Creek?

 

Just down the road a bit at Oak Grove in Franklin.

 

Don’t think im quite as specialized as just a power industry but ne ways Chemical operator here. We provide partial power back to the grid utilizing waste gas from the process and supplementing natural gas boilers to make superhigh pressure steam to turn the turbines... (Cogeneration ) basically... the steam is ultilized in a few other plants in the area as well...

interesting reading all y’alls posts!

 

14/hr! Holy crap I have it good, I made more than that during training, and after a year, substantially more. Guess there’s quite a difference in the industry

 

A couple key transmission lines and the frequency starts to drag and those power plants will go with it. Interconnections etc.
The switching error on the West coast ten or 15 years ago was a good example.

I don’t go north of C470 anymore...

 

The coal plant that I work at is American Electric Power Co-Conesville plant. We are in east central Ohio in the coal fields. Not sure how much more life we have left. Everything that the previous POTUS began is really hurting us now. Our plant is 60 years old, so that is a good long life for a coal plant. Coal is hard on all of the equipment. We have been losing lots of operator folks to the gas plants spring ing up everywhere around here.

 

It's crazy how the market is. At the plant I work at our big 2x1 combined cycle will get cycled down to a 1x1 then 8 hrs later bring it right back on. We also have 3 smaller combined cycle units but they are unicorns they have a combustion turbine, generator and steamer all on one shaft. We cycle those like crazy, double starts everyday.

 

I was there for a good while and I loved the Schedule of it but that changed back in August. Been in oil field since

 

It’s a roustabout company out of Greeley named gusher

 

For the guys working nukes what is the longest time you've been in containment/most dose at one time?

All the folks making the wheels turn round and round my hat is off to you!

 

IT so part of our service company that owns 2 utilities with electric, gas, generation, transmission and distribution.

 

Work in Texas for a small utility, but on the market side. I’m one of the guys you plant operators love getting the phone call from saying to bring on the units

 

First I gotta say Gig’em, I grew up in Bryan/College Station. You still in the area?

 

Live about 15 minutes outside of town.

 

I’m about an hour out, I live on the outskirts of Franklin.

 

I’m one of the lucky ones and I got in the business at 23 years young. I can retire as early as 43 or make it past 50 and live quite comfortably until the end

 

You work right down the road at the newer coal plant then don’t you? It’s scary the way the market is going with the decommissioning of units and load here in Texas only growing