Report Urges Spending to Prevent Power Outages

By Tom Johnson, NJSpotlight.com 

Widespread power outages due to extreme weather, such as powerful hurricanes, are likely to occur more frequently in New Jersey and elsewhere, according to a federal agency.

A new report from the U.S. Department of Energy released last week warns that those occurrences will probably be more common in the future as a result of global climate change creating more stress on an already strained electric power grid.

Storm surges flooding electricity utility power substations. Warming water temperatures, creating problems for power plants relying on water to cool generating units. Increasing air temperatures, which decrease the efficiency of the electric transmission and distribution system at the same time demand for energy is rising.

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