Brooks said routine maintenance on the system, testing, and opportunities to purchase and use power from other states are just some of the big improvements.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — With even colder temperatures on the way next week, several people are having flashbacks to Christmas Eve 2022 when rolling power blackouts affected hundreds of thousands of people.
Flashback to 2022
Some are wondering if this will happen again with temperatures expected to dip into the teens.
“We were out like nine hours, and luckily, we had a fireplace to keep the place warm,” Thom Deason recalled.
Deason and other Duke Energy customers around North Carolina faced the same problem in December 2022. A time for Christmas cheer, and many experienced freezing temperatures for hours without any electricity.
At the time, Duke Energy apologized to customers. The power company explained a unique chain of events that led to blackouts and the first use of rotating outages in company history.
In a release, Duke officials said the combination of rapidly plunging temperatures, demand for electricity that outpaced projections, diminished generation capacity, and loss of purchased power all led to the outages.
“We learn from every storm,” Jeff Brooks with Duke Energy said.
Brooks said they are not anticipating any blackouts for customers with temperatures forecast to drop into the teens next week.
“At this time, we are not anticipating facing any challenges meeting customer needs during the cold snap,” he said. “We have made a lot of improvements and changes since.”
So what’s different?
Brooks said routine maintenance on the system, testing, and opportunities to purchase power from other states are some of the big improvements.
“Our software did not perform during the winter storm,” Brooks admitted. “We have made a lot of improvements since then.”
Brooks said the last resort is temporary outages for customers. If that happens, he said they will communicate in advance as best they can.
“In that type of event, even if we knew there was a possibility of that, our goal would be to try to communicate that the evening before,” Brooks said.
Reporting a power outage
If you do experience a power outage, you can contact and communicate with Duke Energy on their website.
Contact Meghan Bragg at mbragg@wcnc.com and follow her on Facebook, X and Instagram.
