Crews Make Significant Progress Restoring Power

Southern California residents have collectively experienced an incredibly challenging week as extreme weather and devastating fires caused widespread power outages.

The intensity of the windstorm - the most severe in more than a decade - resulted in the need for back-to-back extended Public Safety Power Shutoffs - a measure of last resort used to protect communities. While the length of the outages has been frustrating for customers, they have been necessary to protect public safety.

Ryan Reid, SCE troubleman, addresses common questions about Public Safety Power Shutoffs, inspecting equipment for potential hazards and keeping our communities safe.

"We know some customers have been without electricity for days, and that is incredibly difficult," said Larry Chung, Southern California Edison's incident commander for the wind event. "Our crews have been working tirelessly to monitor the weather, inspect the electric system and complete repairs on damaged lines so we can restore some normalcy for customers."

In some areas, customers had their power turned off and on multiple times, which can be confusing. This happens because as weather fluctuates, wind speeds may drop below PSPS thresholds and power can be restored. Then, as winds increase, shutoffs are required again. SCE tries to notify customers in advance of shutoffs, but with wind and weather changing constantly, sometimes notifications aren't possible.

SCE crews safely work to quickly repair damaged equipment and restore power in LA County.

To determine when and where shutoffs are needed, SCE relies on a mix of fire scientists, meteorologists, supercomputers, 1,700 weather stations capturing real-time conditions and SCE crews on the ground actively patrolling the power lines and conditions.

Every power line has different PSPS requirements.

• Transmission lines - the highways of high-voltage power - require much higher wind speeds before shutoffs are needed. Transmission lines are heavier, blow around less in the wind and are less susceptible to objects blowing into the lines.
• Distribution lines - the lines running through a typical neighborhood - have lower wind speed requirements. These lines are closer to the ground and objects can blow into them - palm fronds or tarps from a backyard, for instance - or fall across them, such as a tall tree uprooted in the wind. Many of these lines in high fire risk areas have been reinforced with coated wires - called covered conductor - which helps raise the thresholds for PSPS. Even then, PSPS may be necessary in extreme conditions.

As winds calm, many customers wonder why their power is not instantly restored. Common causes include:

• Portions of the circuit are still experiencing high winds. Some circuits extend for miles and could traverse areas where winds are high, even if your area is calm.
• Crews are patrolling the lines to deem them safe to re-energize.
• During patrols, crews find damaged equipment that needs repair.

After a PSPS event, lineworkers must physically look at every de-energized line to make sure it is safe and free of hazards. Downed wire, foreign objects in the line like tree branches or tarps from a backyard can all cause a fire when the line is re-energized.

During this weather event, crews found more than 50 instances of damage to de-energized circuits that could have ignited a fire if the power had not been shut off.

Currently, 3,500 SCE crews, contractors and mutual assistance personnel are working to repair damage and safely restore power.

For more information, visit sce.com/psps.