From relentless snow storms, to record rainfall numbers, the news has had no shortage of national weather events to report in recent days and weeks. Power outages due to these events have been widespread. And it begs a question: is this a short term anomaly or a long term trend? Unfortunately, the increased frequency of severe weather events combined with an aging power grid seems to suggest the latter.
Here are just a few headlines from Google:
Century Old Grid
Energy.gov has developed a power grid infographic to illustrate how complex the power grid is and the age of the network. “Parts of this network are more than a century old – 70 percent of the grid’s transmission lines and power transformers are over 25 years old, and the average age of power plants is over 30 years old.”
Is El Niño or La Niñas?
Jessica Bluden’s January Climate.gov article, reflects upon the record high temperatures for 2016 and whether the natural climate events will continue to increase in intensity. She says “So it’s not really possible to know exactly how warm or cool next year, or the year after, or the year after that will be. But underlying this uncertainty is the certainty that the annual global temperature record has been broken five times since the beginning of the 21st century and the certainty that the global temperature has been increasing around 0.3°F per decade over the past 50 years.”
In combination with climate events and an aging grid, this is not the first time Global Power Supply has been calling for our customers to be prepared. Over the last five years we have published several articles to encourage power preparedness:
Five Key Questions to Ask Before You Need a Backup Generator
Four Tips to Keep Your Facility Online
7 Tips for Diesel Generators in Emergency Preparedness
One bad storm will leave you powerless!
Get answers today to overcome the certainty of an aging power grid and unexpected weather events.
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