All the predictions said that California would suffer a summer of rolling blackouts and a stalled economy, and a huge bill to foot, but as the summer comes to its end it looks as if the state has squeaked through without serious damage.
The North American Electric Reliability Council had projected that the state’s 34 million residents would suffer 260 hours of blackouts during its peak power season, but they have, it seems, got away with it. A Reliability Council spokesman has been quoted as saying that “…everybody feels that we dodged a bullet. We were very lucky”.
Going into the summer months state officials warned residents to expect a continuation of the pattern that had seen six rolling blackouts since January, prompting homeowners and businesses to buy generators and the police and the state governor to draw up emergency plans. But it wasn’t the emergency measures that saved the state, or the natural economy of its inhabitants, or the purchase of emergency generators – it was the weather. The expected long drawn out heat waves simply didn’t materialise, and despite coming to the brink several times (according to Energy Institute director Severin Boenstein), the summer was blackout free. Moreover, only a handful of jobs have been lost in the crisis, against forcasts of tens of thousands.
Officials however are warning that getting away with it isn’t the same thing as solving the crisis, and that it could still come to a head during the autumn. Moreover the state has lost over $7 billion in emergency power purchases.