Compressor startup is more intensive than lighting. Once the compressor is running it’s a pretty steady power consumption.
A window unit, for example, on startup (assuming it doesn’t have a smooth start) will pull a full 20A. However, during operation it ultimately will pull around 5A.
That said, there’s not some sort of special electrical budget which makes the lights in NYT come from baseload generators vs peakers. If those lights turned off, the total grid load would go down by the amount of power those lights consume. And, as it turns out, those lights are consuming around 150MW. That’s ~4 steel mills worth of heat just being shoved into the atmosphere for advertisement. It’s at least 1 powerplant’s worth of power.
Shutting those lights off would take the coordination of something like 10 businesses vs telling the millions of residence of NY to adjust their power consumption. They absolutely would make a difference. It’s not like there isn’t still a base load of power needed with those lights off.
Edit: My numbers are off, it’s closer to 35MW. ~1 steel mill worth
Based on your 5amp draw, thats 600w, which a bit on the low side, but we can use it as an average. Assuming most (75%) of residences have AC units, 2.775 million AC units try to run at the same time, using 1665 MW.
Also, please stop using that 150MW usage of times square, particularly if you’re taking it from GoogleAI. I cannot find ANY data supporting that (see possible originating claim for its use here).
Data instead suggests ~35MW draw for the billboards, using a huge overestimation of the draw (since it assumes all buildings in times square have the same number/size of billboards as times square tower, which is false). This is ~2% of the energy required/used by AC units (not including starting draw), which is tiny.
Its worth us pushing for, but lets be clear about what kind of impact that will have on the grid.
But I’d argue that 2% is still something to look at. A 2% shortfall in power capacity still means you are looking at rolling blackouts to handle the demand/production mismatch. If power has to be rationed, then I’d much rather have an extra ~50k AC units running vs pretty lights for advertisements. Especially since load tends to peak during the day anyways. Shutting off the lights during the day makes sense.
Compressor startup is more intensive than lighting. Once the compressor is running it’s a pretty steady power consumption.
A window unit, for example, on startup (assuming it doesn’t have a smooth start) will pull a full 20A. However, during operation it ultimately will pull around 5A.
That said, there’s not some sort of special electrical budget which makes the lights in NYT come from baseload generators vs peakers. If those lights turned off, the total grid load would go down by the amount of power those lights consume. And, as it turns out, those lights are consuming around 150MW. That’s ~4 steel mills worth of heat just being shoved into the atmosphere for advertisement. It’s at least 1 powerplant’s worth of power.
Shutting those lights off would take the coordination of something like 10 businesses vs telling the millions of residence of NY to adjust their power consumption. They absolutely would make a difference. It’s not like there isn’t still a base load of power needed with those lights off.
Edit: My numbers are off, it’s closer to 35MW. ~1 steel mill worth
NYC has ~3.75mil housing units.
Based on your 5amp draw, thats 600w, which a bit on the low side, but we can use it as an average. Assuming most (75%) of residences have AC units, 2.775 million AC units try to run at the same time, using 1665 MW.
Also, please stop using that 150MW usage of times square, particularly if you’re taking it from GoogleAI. I cannot find ANY data supporting that (see possible originating claim for its use here).
Data instead suggests ~35MW draw for the billboards, using a huge overestimation of the draw (since it assumes all buildings in times square have the same number/size of billboards as times square tower, which is false). This is ~2% of the energy required/used by AC units (not including starting draw), which is tiny.
Its worth us pushing for, but lets be clear about what kind of impact that will have on the grid.
Thanks for digging in to the numbers!
Caught me. Was just an easy number to pull.
But I’d argue that 2% is still something to look at. A 2% shortfall in power capacity still means you are looking at rolling blackouts to handle the demand/production mismatch. If power has to be rationed, then I’d much rather have an extra ~50k AC units running vs pretty lights for advertisements. Especially since load tends to peak during the day anyways. Shutting off the lights during the day makes sense.
Whoa, 150MW of lightning in just Times Square? Or is that for all 5 boros? That’s a mind blowing number for lighting. Consider me moved.
Edit: oh. Just saw the other commenter breaking it down. Nevermind.