The reason why we interconnect grids has nothing to do with politics and everything to do with physics, politics can sometimes lead to disconnections (like how the Baltic states disconnected from the Russian grid earlier this year) but it comes with great cost and involves careful planning (the fact that the Baltic states remained connected for almost three years after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine should give you an hint of how challenging it was).
replyThe bigger the grid, the more efficient and resilient it is (and managing electric grids on islands is a nightmare), but it comes with a significant complexity and means restarting from zero is harder.
Interdependent grids are usually good: they allow you to average out the effect of a single power station failure over a much larger area, and to amortize prices from a wider area of suppliers.
replySure but if you can't cut off failing parts in a sane way it seems like a liability.
replyLike, what can you do, use some 1000 of MW to melt iron rods or something to give the power stations time to slow down? Free wheels?
What the heck are you talking about?
replyDon't you realize that the smaller the grid, the more important the instantaneous load variations can be in relative term and the harder it is to keep things running smoothly? It's not a theoretical concern, it's why electric networks on islands are much harder to work with and much more prone to collapse than bigger networks.
I think the point I am trying to make is that the risk for big area outtakes are lower with more figurative islands.
replyIt is not. The bigger the network, the more stable it is, that's why countries keep interconnecting with each other despite political tensions between them (no pun intended).
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