As the heat wave continues, individuals are being asked to keep conserving energy
This morning, over 250 customers in Indio were without power. Power has now been restored. Details to that outage can be found here. Officials with IID said it was due to equipment failure in the energy structure and can be common when the system is under stress.
We haven’t seen any blackouts take place in the Coachella Valley yet and, as of Wednesday, we aren’t expecting any. California ISO tweeted, “#ItsWorking! No #poweroutages anticipated for tonight. #Conservation, imported energy and wind production were key factors for avoiding emergency stages. #GoodJobCA #FlexAlert still in place until 9 pm.”
Robert Schettler is the public information officer for Imperial Irrigation Distrct (IID). He said, “When we are able to conserve energy, it takes less stress off the grid, it also keeps the energy demand down.”
Southern California Edison also emailed its customers thanking those taking initiative to conserve energy.
Sherri Dickson is a Coachella Valley resident. She has been conserving energy in her home. She said, “We are not doing laundry during the day and we are keeping all of the blinds down, we have a house full of windows.”
Governor Gavin Newsom Wednesday in a press conference said, “A typical summer day we are using about 38,000 megawatts.” He explained that Wednesday he was expecting the usage to be about 10,000 megawatts more. Flex Alert asked people to conserve an hour earlier Wednesday from 2 p.m. - 9p.m. instead of 3 p.m. - 10 p.m.
Schettler added, “This is a time where energy is somewhat scarce because the heatwave is affecting all of California.”
Some tips ISO recommends to conserve power include:
- Setting the air conditioner to 78 and above
- Turning off lights if they are not in use
- Unplugging things from the wall when you’re not using them because they can still pull power when not in use
- Cooking during the early hours of the day
- Using larger appliances like dishwashers and washing machines during early hours of the day
- Close blinds and drapes
Schettler added, “This is a heat wave, we have elderly people, we have young people too and no one wants to experience that if we don’t have to”
