Five days of extreme heat on the Front Range is taking its toll on the power grid.
Equipment is not cooling the way it normally would, which is causing transformers to “pop,” Xcel Energy spokesman Gabriel Romero said.
“Think of it like overloading a plug in your house with a hairdryer or something,” Romero said. “It is a real problem for us right now.”
The utility has all of its crews working in shifts trying to keep up with the repairs.
On Monday, when the temperature gauge hit 105 tying an all-time high, the Xcel grid used 6,911 megawatt-hours of energy, which is the measurement of total power consumption in a single hour, officials said.
“That is the closet we have come to the highest peak, which was 6,940 megawatt-hours back in 2007,” he said.
That year, the temperatures in the last week of July pushed records and stressed the power grid, causing short-term outages.
Usually in the summer, when temperatures are around the 80s, 5,000 megawatt-hours are used, Romero said.
Currently, Xcel has enough excess power that officials are not expecting any rolling blackouts or brownouts, but should temperatures stay sweltering, that could change.
The National Weather Service has forecast a high of 103 for Denver Tuesday. The mercury hit 100 at DIA at 12:53 p.m., tying a record for number of consecutive days of temperatures of 100 or higher. The weather service expects temperatures to remain in the mid- to high 90s through Saturday.
“The longer it stays in the 90s, the more taxing it is on the system,” Romero said. “If we lost a major source of power, that would trigger us turning off power for people.”
Ryan Parker: 303-954-2409, rparker@denverpost.com or
