It would shut down. It actually wouldn't take very long to shutdown if it wasn't managed, it's a balancing act between supply and demand and everything has to be at the right frequency and phase.
Many different levels for this answer.
1. Managing distribution and power flow
- If not managed you WILL burn up power lines, transformers etc. The ENTIRE system will crash significant physical damage will be done and a large region will have no electric service for an extended period of time. i.e. weeks to months depending on what fails first where and how much and does it cause a cascading failure? A cascading failure could be excessively bad. One power line not so bad. Multiple power lines worse. Multiple transformers is the worst of all. If enough large transformers fail then outages can last several months.
2. Managing Generation
- If not managed properly will WILL have equipment failures. These failures can occur anywhere from fuel handling all they way through to your generator. You could even have a cascading failure. Some simple failures could just have a small component fail and they automatic system shutdowns begin. You could also have a small Component fail that then over stresses other components and start a cascading failure. Down time ranges widely. It depends on what type of electric generation we are talking about, where the failure is in your system and how bad the failure is. It could be anywhere from hours to months. Bad enough and the plant may never function again.
3. Managing local distribution.
- Similar to #1 but smaller scale. As with # 1 you can have fires but in this case the dropped power lines and fires would be in residential neighborhoods or other built up areas.
I hope you find this useful
We will get more blackouts like one in 2004.
Then the problems be comer more devastating.
Just really confused...
