El Dorado County shut off first in rolling blackouts, PG&E says; Winters knocked out, too
Ongoing coverage: More blackouts? Here’s what Californians need to know for this weekend
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More than 75,000 Pacific Gas and Electric customers in the Sacramento region were without power Friday evening amid a dangerous heat wave including over 72,000 customers in El Dorado County plunged into darkness by the first rolling blackouts in nearly 20 years. At 9 p.m., the statewide grid operator lifted the order, meaning no more rolling blackouts, and power will be restored.
Customers without electricity about 8 p.m. Friday included over 21,000 customers in El Dorado Hills, nearly 11,000 each in Placerville and Diamond Springs, nearly 15,000 in Shingle Springs, about 8,200 in Camino and more than 6,200 in Pollock Pines, according to PG&E data.
The outage in El Dorado County was among California’s rolling blackouts Friday evening, the first imposed since the energy crisis in 2001, PG&E confirmed.
Also, more than 3,300 Yolo County customers were without power Friday. That included over 2,000 customers in the Winters area without power because of the rolling blackouts and about 1,300 customers in Woodland who lost electricity due to an earlier outage not connected to the supply problem.
Winters’ power was restored just after 8:30 p.m. while others remained in the dark.
Earlier, around the 5 p.m. hour, more than 3,600 homes and businesses in the Rocklin area around Sunset Whitney Recreation Area had lost electricity before being restored, according to PG&E outage logs.
The manager of California’s power grid warned Friday that electricity supplies are being strained to a degree not seen in almost 15 years. The California Independent System Operator issued a Stage 3 emergency alert, the first time such an alert was issued since the energy crisis of 2001, triggering rolling blackouts, according to Cal ISO.
Californians are being urged to urgently conserve energy as temperatures in most Valley spots topped 100 degrees. The National Weather Service reported a high temperature of 106 degrees Friday at the Sacramento Executive Airport, which tied a record set on the same date in 1967.
Peak usage across the state was 46,802 megawatts at 4:55 p.m. Friday, according to the Independent System Operator. Thursday’s peak was 42,327 megawatts.
This story was originally published August 14, 2020 at 6:58 PM.
