AUSTIN, Texas – While many CPS Energy customers have had their power restored, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas says there is still a possibility of some limited outages Thursday evening or Friday morning due to the frigid weather.
Still, ERCOT said in a release Friday that it’s hopeful more energy generation will become available.
Recommended Videos
“The generating units that were online this morning have remained on throughout the day,” ERCOT Senior Director of System Operations Dan Woodfin said in a written statement. “With generation holding steady, we are hopeful that more generation will continue to become available.”
Although the snow is coming to an end, there will still be below-freezing temperatures, snow and ice throughout the night into the morning, possibly leading to the limited outages. These outages will help keep the grid stable when usage increases, according to ERCOT.
According to CPS Energy’s outage map, as of around 7 p.m. Thursday, there are 215 active outages and 5,103 customers without power. These numbers are subject to change throughout the night.
Those that are without electricity may fall into one of these three categories, according to ERCOT:
- Areas out due to ice storm damage on the distribution system
- Areas that were taken out of service due to the energy emergency load shed that need to be restored manually (i.e., sending a crew to the location to reenergize the line)
- Large industrial facilities that voluntarily went offline to help during this energy emergency
As of 6:30 p.m. Thursday, ERCOT said nearly 36,000 MW of generation remains on forced outage due to this winter weather event. Of that, approximately 21,400 MW is thermal generation and the rest is wind and solar.