In the UK, gas companies assume that if a supply is interrupted, it can?t be reinstated until every property has been visited (or disconnected) to ensure that no gas appliance could be spewing unburnt gas.
It maybe that major industrial users are the target I suppose?
Tim
Interesting question. I was only half listening to the report on the radio but IIRC they were saying domestic users would get preference over big industrial users. I *suspect* that on industrial sites it is the responsibility of the owner to maintain positive pressure in the lines after the meter, and to have an appropriate flushing / recovery process if this fails. Wasn't another issue in domestic supplies to avoid the risk of explosion in the pipes if they became contaminated with air following loss of supply pressure? Perhaps that was only an issue with coal gas, which could (I believe) contain hydrogen with its wide explosive range.
There's a methodology for managing a gas shortage in the relevant National Emergency Plan. I think it rests in part on the way licences and contracts provide for operators to declare a pipeline system emergency if the pressure is a risk to users; they can then require non-commercial users to avoid using gas.
Did you mean commercial? Cutting off domestic properties can mean no heating, no hot water and no cooking - effectively making a home uninhabitable. Then there is the problem of isolating every individual property before turning the gas back on and visiting each property to bring it on safely.
Will they actually cut off supplies, or just apply a penalty rate above a certain m^3 per month?
Possibly but I?m not sure most folk would call that ?rationing? (even if the end result was the same).
Tim
Bother. Yes. Sorry about that.
I would guess that it would work in much the same way that electricity was rationed during a series of strikes in the early 1970s. Big industrial users were instructed to stop using it at certain times, in line with their contact terms.
Except it's generally considered safe to turn off and back on an electrical supply.
What must be considered when turning on a gas supply is where flame detection systems have become faulty.
If this was going to be a recurrence, i would have thought the equivalent of a no-volts contactor could be used on an incoming gas supply.
Stop using simply means not turning on anything that consumes gas. That is a normal day-to-day activity that big industrial consumers can be compelled to do, without any need to disconnect the gas supply to them.
Big industrial consumers may have a 'dual fuel' capability, depending on their business. My last employer ran a tunnel kiln for calcining refractory bricks at high temperature (1500C), which could fire on either gas or oil. I imagine most brick kilns could do likewise, and perhaps the steel and glass industries or parts of them, but I doubt that the tableware or sanitaryware industries would do it, where the quality and appearance of the fired items is paramount.
The ones with dual fuel will be the lucky ones. The others will simply have to stop production if gas is rationed in that way.
Long while ago now but the supply agreement for gas heating for an industrial Bainite salt bath allowed for temporary disruption of supply. (used for heat treating large spherical bearing components)
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The nation's gas piping holds more than a day's gas, so it's not possible to stop supply for part of a day.
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