Running Water and Hydro Power are over-rated!

Every winter there comes a time during an extended cold snap with temperatures down into the teens and strong northerly winds, that our domestic water line freezes and we lose running water to the house; or our hydro intake gets blocked by ice and we lose our hydro-electric power.  Or both.  And it usually happens around 1 AM, although not always, thankfully.

Looking down the hydro line from the dam--things do get a little icy in the winter!

Getting ready to check the intake.

Ice forming around the dam, waterline, and supporting cables.

This is what the hydro intake is supposed to look like--the holes are clear and plenty of water enters the pipe.

This is what the intake looks like when super-cooled water hits it.  The ice forms under the surface of the water on the intake grate itself, blocking the intake holes.   To fix it I have to hike up the mountain to the intake to clear the ice with a long bar.

Clearing ice off the intake with a six-foot steel bar.

Once the ice is chipped off the intake, it has to be moved away from the grate, as the suction will suck it back on if you don't remove it from the area.

Here's our intake pool.  Note that the pool does ice over and that the level dropped about a foot since the last time it froze.

The intake pool with lots of water over the grate.

In cold weather, we leave water running in all the taps in an attempt to keep the waterline from freezing.  In the lodge we sometimes get a warning of an impending frozen water line when the water slows to a trickle.  When this happens, we grab buckets and pots and pans and fill them with water at all three faucets in the house, hopefully to last us until the water starts running again. If we need to, we can go to the stream or the hydro exhaust to fill more buckets. Jen prefers Method One. 

Water inventory stacked everywhere!

It's handy to have some buckets of water stored in the bathroom as well.

It's also nice in case someone needs a drink--nothin' tastes better than water fresh out of a bucket!

Once the intake is cleared, the pipe fills, the pelton wheel turns the generator, power comes on, and this old wooden waterline carries the water out of the hydro shed.

Outside, the hydro shed turns into an ice sculpture park.