| AusTxDevelopment |
Oct 16, 2012 4:17 PM |
Quote:
Originally Posted by P3FE
(Post 5868020)
I never doubted for one moment that the telephone poles on the north and east sides of the federal court house were going to be eventually removed and the power lines buried...until today. They aren't coming down. The brick in the side walk is being cut to accommodate those poles and I'm, well I don't know what the right word is. Confusion might approximate it.
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They are not doing it now because of the cost. It costs between $250,000 and $500,000 in the suburbs for just a couple of blocks, probably much more downtown, to bury existing above ground power lines. My company had done it for new construction before. Obviously the power has to be cut and rerounted for a short period during the transition. It's like closing part of the highway - you have to have a detour. The cost goes up if the lines are the main power lines to what are called 'protected' or 'exempt' buildings - in other words buildings that cannot have their power cut off. All those office buildings that were exempted from the rolling blackouts that hit the rest of us a couple of years ago? It's because they had tech companies in them who made deals with the city to exempt their buildings and not cut their power. To take existing lines off-line from exempt buildings, even for a short period, requires you to create secondary line when there is no redudant power - the cost can be massive.
Yes, these companies have backup generators, but that's only for emergencies and backup generators do not give off the clean consistently smooth power stream required by tech companies to run their computers and data centers. Some companies have huge (expensive) power cleaners that scrub the power coming in from the generators when necessary, but that's a luxury that only the Intels, AMDs and Apples can afford. As we learned from the rolling blackouts, the downtown grid cannot be partially shut off, so it never gets shut off. And there's not much redundant power downtown. Also, not many large backup generators for the downtown buildings either. Not the type that can run your whole office - just the emergency lights & elevators kind. |
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