HOUSTON — As of Monday, 12 p.m. CT, CenterPoint Energy says it has restored power to more than 700,000 customers who were impacted by last week’s sudden and destructive severe weather, which included Category 2 Hurricane-like winds and tornadoes that quickly struck its service territory.
Restoration continues for the just over 200,000 customers who are currently without power and is expected to be substantially complete by Wednesday evening. CenterPoint continues to work safely and urgently, but crews are encountering areas of significant damage accompanied by difficult restorations. These locations include parts of Bellaire, Spring Branch, the Heights, Lazybrook/Timbergrove and Cottage Grove.
Crews are finding equipment buried under multiple downed trees, large limbs, heavy debris and fences, as well as entire large trees down on roads, properties and CenterPoint’s wires. In addition, the recent heavy rainfall across the area has caused issues with soil and tree stability, further complicating restoration efforts. While crews are addressing the challenges as safely as possible, these issues are impacting the pace of the restorations in certain areas.
“We understand the past four days have been very difficult as our customers have worked to recover from the devastating impacts of last week’s severe weather. We also understand those customers who are still without power are dealing with extra levels of anxiety and concern in their lives, especially given the hot weather,” said Lynnae Wilson, Senior Vice President, Electric Business. “We are putting all our available resources on safely restoring the remaining customers who are out, and we encourage customers to continue to utilize cooling stations, stay hydrated and take other precautions.”
The company also shared the reasons why some customers may have their power restored, while others nearby are still without power. One common reason is a situation known as a “nested outage.” This occurs when, even after fixing the main issue, smaller problems still cause outages in specific areas. These secondary issues can arise from unseen damage or overloaded systems.
Another reason could be that customers on the same street might be on different electrical circuits. Customers on different circuits can experience varied restoration times because each circuit may have different levels of damage or may be repaired in a different sequence. This means that while one circuit is fully restored, another might still be undergoing repairs. They may also be impacted by a more localized issue, such as damage to fuses, transformers, meters, electric lines or other electric infrastructure.
As the company gets further into the recovery process, it is important that customers check for damage to their equipment to ensure that they are able to receive service as soon as the system is energized. This will prevent further delays to restoration.
Furthermore, CenterPoint Energy reminds customers to remain safe and:
- Stay at least 35 feet away from downed power lines and damaged utility equipment. Be especially mindful of downed lines that could be hidden and treat all downed lines as if they are energized.
- Be cautious around work crews and give them plenty of room to safely assess damages and make repairs.
- Only use a portable generator in a well-ventilated area and never run it inside or in a garage to avoid carbon monoxide fumes, which can be deadly.
- Never connect a portable electric generator directly to your building’s electrical system during a power outage; electricity could backfeed into the power lines, potentially endangering CenterPoint Energy workers, mutual assistance workers or members of the public.
Source: CenterPoint Energy
