MOORHEAD — While rolling blackouts remain a possibility due to heightened power demand across the central U.S., Moorhead Public Service said outages like those its customers experienced Tuesday, Feb. 16, are unlikely to happen Wednesday.
MPS General Manager Travis Schmidt said in a statement released about noon Wednesday that MPS has been monitoring the ongoing Southwest Power Pool Energy Emergency Alert situation and will continue to do so for at least the next 48 hours.
Southwest Power Pool is an electric grid operator serving 14 central U.S. states, including North Dakota, South Dakota and the western edge of Minnesota.
On Tuesday, it went in and out of Energy Emergency Alert Level 3 in response to unprecedented strains on the regional grid prompted by the frigid weather in southern states.
At EEA Level 3, SPP may call on utilities under its purview to initiate rolling blackouts and for a short time Tuesday morning MPS instituted blackouts affecting about 9,800 customers.
ADVERTISEMENT
Schmidt said Wednesday morning that through Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning SPP was at an EEA Level 2.
He said if the situation reaches Level 3, MPS will be required to resume rolling blackouts, though he added that based on information from SPP and the Western Area Power Administration there was a low probability of entering EEA Level 3 on Wednesday.
"However, staff wanted to make you aware of MPS’ situation today due to the extreme weather conditions in the SPP footprint and the possibility, even if it is low, of more rolling blackouts," Schmidt said.
He stressed that MPS will provide as much advanced notice as possible before commencing rolling blackouts in Moorhead if they become necessary.
He said if MPS restarts rolling blackouts, the first area affected will be in the Red Zone, seen in the red zone of the map below, and then alternate to the Blue Zone, see attached map, every other 30 minutes until MPS is allowed to go back to normal operations by SPP and WAPA.
ADVERTISEMENT
