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Mountain-rescues t1_j1ht5ek wrote

Reply to comment by westplains1865 in Factbox: About 1.2 million without power in United States from winter storms by Smithy2232

I'm in rural Alaska but I"lll take a shot (I have relatives in northern Maine). Maine, like us, has huge rural swaths. Like no joke rural. These are probably the areas with outages due to the sheer amount of trees falling on the lines, aging infrastructure and winds from the ocean. If your moving there and buying a home if it doesn't have a toyostove, a wood stove or a full house generator it I'd call it a deal breaker and keep looking

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in-game_sext t1_j1isv0d wrote

Everytime I see above-ground wires strewn between fucking wooden posts sticking out of the ground, I'm reminded how poor our infrastructure is in the US. We need to have started investing in buried line decades ago. Edison himself would recognize the technology and that should concern us all.

My rural county got cut off for two weeks about three winters ago. It was traced back to the fact that power for over 150,000 people could be traced to one. fucking. line. coming over a hill and a blown-over tree took it. Ridiculous.

Instead of proper upgrades that utility company (PG&E here in California) chooses to pay out stock dividends to investors. Their negligence has resulted in death and destruction in the form of everything from fire their equipment has started to leveling entire blocks of cities like the infamous San Bruno gas line explosion. We need to get our priorities straight and stop giving these companies a pass.

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LiftYesPlease t1_j1j3tg4 wrote

A book was written not long ago about this. California Burning. Catherine Blunt. Absolute greed led to the campfires and the unreliable infrastructure of California utilities.

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