[imagesource: YouTube / Last Week Tonight with John Oliver]

Misery loves company, so you might be pleased to know that America also has a serious power grid problem.

They probably don’t have an app that lets them know at which time of the day they’ll be without power, but there are issues nonetheless.

America experienced ‘rolling blackouts’ in the midst of extreme weather conditions in February.

That’s not an isolated incident, and there are fears that due to the country’s ever-increasing electrical use and the added pressure this will place on the grid, it could well get worse.

Welcome, America.

On this past Sunday’s episode of Last Week Tonight, host John Oliver ran through how it’s come to this point.

Mashable with the summary:

…Oliver digs in to the history of the power grid, its issues, and why they haven’t been fixed yet, including the difficulties associated with rearranging the grid due to the growing focus on renewable energy (something hampered by a need for more transmission lines, which is in turn hampered by good old bureaucracy).

One key difference is probably that America’s power grid’s failure isn’t due to decades of looting and corruption.

Take it away for our lunchtime viewing, John:

Getting off Eskom’s power grid doesn’t come cheap.

I’m not sure about the cost of doing so in America, but perhaps it’s something more and more Yanks may consider going forward.

[source:mashable]