Con Edison Battles Heat Wave Reaching NYC Area
NEW YORK – As the heatwave which scorched the central and southern parts of the U.S. arrives to the East Coast, Con Edison has imposed brownouts throughout New York City to meet the heavy demand for electricity.
Power usage on Thursday was the highest it’s been all year in NYC and Con Edison said they expect usage to break all time records on Friday.
With nearly 3.2 million customers requiring heavy amounts of electricity in the New York City and Westchester areas to power their air conditioners, Con Edison is confident they can meet their needs this weekend, but not without a few adjustments.
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Con Edison has assured customers they’d have enough power to meet their needs, but warned that heavy usage could stress some power lines and generating facilities, resulting in customers losing power temporarily.
"Obviously when you have a sustained heat wave like this, it’s important for everyone to pitch in," said Con Edison spokesman Bob McGee, stressing the fact that business and residential customers must try to conserve power during a time like this.
But Con Edison still ran into problems as usage rates soared Thursday night going into early Friday morning.
In order to meet that demand, Con Edison chose to reduce the voltage in the power resulting in "brownouts" for around 100,000 customers in the Westchester and Queens area, with only 600 cases of complete power loss reported.
Early Friday morning, about 500 customers were without power.
Con Edison said customers shouldn’t notice the difference in electricity during a power reduction, aside from the dimming of incandescent lights or motors and hot water heaters not running like they usually do.
Temperatures are expected to reach 99 F degrees Friday in the New York City area, according to the National Weather Service, which issued an extreme heat warning until 10:00 p.m. EST.
Con Edison said that customers could reduce power usage by turning up their air conditioners thermostat, along with turning off lights and elevators and using their own private generators if they have them.
