PG&E, power grid operator again urge energy conservation amid continued heat

SAN FRANCISCO — With a prolonged heat wave still affecting most of the Bay Area, PG&E and the state’s power grid operator on Wednesday encouraged people to continue reducing their energy use to avoid the possibility of rotating power outages.

That encouragement comes as California Independent System Operator, which manages electricity over the state’s high-voltage transmission lines, announced another Energy Emergency Alert 1 late Wednesday morning. That was upgraded to an EEA 2 less than two hours later.

Cal ISO narrowly avoided having to institute the rolling blackouts Tuesday when the state saw an all-time record high power grid peak demand of 52,061 megawatts.

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Officials also issued an Energy Emergency Alert (EEA) 3 Tuesday, the third of three emergency alert stages which means rotating power outages are “imminent or in progress.”  The alert went into effect at 5:17 p.m. Tuesday, but Cal ISO announced that the EEA was ended and that consumer conservation had help avoid rotating blackouts.

Nevertheless, there were still tens of thousands of people who lost power due to heat-related outages amid triple-digit temperature heat Tuesday, with about 57,000 customers impacted at the peak around 9 p.m., PG&E spokesperson Deanna Contreras said.

Crews from the utility worked overnight to restore power and got the number of customers affected down to about 3,585 as of 9 a.m. Wednesday, with more than 3,000 of those located in the South Bay.

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With temperatures around the Bay Area and elsewhere in the state forecasted to reach triple digits again Wednesday — though slightly lower than Tuesday’s — CAISO has issued another statewide Flex Alert to call for voluntary electricity conservation particularly during the hours of 4 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The grid operator encourages people to take steps like setting their home or business thermostats to 78 degrees or higher during that time, as well as to avoid the use of major appliances and to turn off any unnecessary lights. Additional information and conservation tips are available at FlexAlert.org.