Sacramento, Calif. – Scorching heat pushed California’s electricity supply to the brink Monday as authorities investigated at least 29 possible heat-related deaths, most in the Central Valley, where temperatures reached 115 degrees over the weekend.
An eighth day of intense heat pushed electricity usage to a peak of 50,270 megawatts – a record for California but short of the 52,000 megawatts experts had predicted for the day.
“It appears we have ridden out this mammoth peak demand without any problems,” said Stephanie McCorkle, spokeswoman for the California Independent System Operator, which manages the state’s power grid. “This was the most strained the system has ever been.”
Meanwhile, utilities in the St. Louis area and New York City labored to restore power to hundreds of thousands whose electricity was knocked out by storms and equipment failures.
Hoping to avoid involuntary rolling blackouts in California, ISO declared a “Stage 2” emergency, which calls for businesses to reduce their power usage in exchange for lower rates.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger also directed state agencies to reduce electricity use by 25 percent; he urged local and municipal governments and universities to do the same.
The reductions appeared to work. By 5 p.m. ISO officials said the threat of rolling blackouts had passed.
Tens of thousands of homes and businesses lost power in California on Sunday because of heavy electricity use and high temperatures.
Some 50,000 customers in northern California still were without electricity, including 35,000 in San Jose. About 20,000 Los Angeles customers also remained without electricity.
Among heat-related deaths was a man in his 40s found on a lawn Sunday in Fresco County with a body temperature above 109 degrees. A woman collapsed and died while walking from her home to a drugstore not far from Death Valley National Park, where temperatures hit 125 degrees Sunday.
In Arizona, authorities said heat may have contributed to the deaths of as many as four men in the Phoenix area over the weekend. The deaths came during a three-day streak of record-breaking temperatures in Phoenix. The temperature soared to 114 degrees Sunday, breaking the record of 112 set in 1906.
The temperature hit 114 again Monday – tying the record for the day.
Meanwhile, in St. Louis, more than 200,000 homes and businesses were still without electricity Monday, down from the more than a half-million that were left in the dark last week after strong storms knocked down power lines. Four deaths in the region were attributed to the storms or the heat.
