California’s worst heat wave in more than a decade is expected to peak in the Bay Area Thursday as temperatures hit triple digits, stressing the region’s electric power grid and putting more people in peril after the heat-related deaths of two people in San Jose this week.
The National Weather Service has issued heat warnings for much of the Bay Area. Wednesday’s temperatures reached 103 in Livermore, 91 in San Jose and 79 at the Oakland Airport. The heatwave will continue on Thursday, with temperatures reaching 101 degrees in Gilroy and the southern Santa Clara Valley, and up to 107 degrees in Livermore and Concord, according to Monterey’s National Weather Service meteorologist Will Pi.
Weak onshore winds mean that the ocean won’t cool off the Bay Area, as usual. The heat is due to a persistent high pressure system that is creating heat by compressing air in the American west and southwest, Pi said.
“This is the most impactful heat we’ve seen in quite some time,” said Brian Garcia, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. “It is so far reaching, and impacting millions and millions of people.”
Santa Clara County officials Wednesday announced that two elderly residents died Monday from the heat, a 72-year-old man and an 87-year-old woman, both in San Jose. No heat-related deaths were reported in Alameda, Contra Costa and San Mateo counties.
“It is tragic when someone dies of hyperthermia since in most every case it could have been prevented,” commented Dr. Michelle Jorden, Santa Clara County Medical Examiner-Coroner’s Office. “Hyperthermia and heat stress happen when a body’s heat-regulation system cannot handle the heat. It can happen to anyone, which it is why it is so important to be in a cool location, drink plenty of water, and take a cool bath or shower if you are getting too hot.”
Many Bay Area cities are offering cooling centers to help beat the heat, especially for vulnerable populations.
The last severe heat wave, which the weather service dubbed “the remarkable heat wave of July 2006,” claimed the lives of at least 100 people in California, many of them elderly.
With millions of Californians turning on air conditioning to stay cool, the state’s energy grid will be under added stress Thursday, according to the agency that monitors the state’s electricity supply.
To prevent outages, the California Independent System Operator issued a statewide flex alert for Wednesday, asking residents and businesses to voluntarily cut back on electricity use during peak hours (2 to 9 p.m.) in anticipation of increased air conditioning use. As of 5 p.m. Wednesday, the California ISO had not yet announced a flex alert for Thursday.
The last time the California ISO called a flex alert was June 2016. Californians responded, reducing the load on the power grid by 500 megawatts, according to spokesman Steven Greenlee — saving enough to power about 500,000 homes.
But experts doubt the state Thursday will face the kind of rolling blackouts and shortages suffered in the state’s 2000 and 2001 energy crisis.
Since 2001, the California grid infrastructure has become more robust, adding generating capacity, including renewable resources. Regulations have also been changed dramatically.
“We’re in a lot better shape,” said James Sweeney, professor of management science and engineering at Stanford University and author of California Electricity Crisis. “Still, we’re going to have pressure on the grid.”
Officials with PG&E expect localized power outages Thursday, the result of equipment failure due to the scorching temperatures and increase in electricity flowing through its lines.
Between Friday and Tuesday, more than 236,000 of the company’s 5.4 million electrical customers in California lost power. More than 118,000 of the affected customers were in the Bay Area, though power had been restored to all but 1,230 by Tuesday evening.
“The outages we’ve seen over the last few days were a result of the severe heat impacting equipment and causing transformer failure,” PG&E spokesman Jeff Smith said. He compared the spike in temperatures statewide to a “summer storm,” adding that searing temperatures can cause equipment failure, resulting in outages.
Residents can help avoid power outages by turning off all unnecessary lights, using major appliances before 2 p.m. and after 9 p.m., and setting air conditioners to 78 degrees or higher.
The crisis in 2000-01 emerged while the western states experienced a combination of bad weather — a hot summer, followed by a cold winter — and a drought limiting hydroelectric power from the Pacific Northwest, Sweeney said. The weather and drought stressed the grid, and poor regulations helped push the system into crisis.
The influx of renewable energy has helped offset the shut-downs of big plants, including the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, and Morro Bay, a natural-gas fired plant, and provided a valuable, new generating resource.
California had no solar generation on its grid during the last energy crisis. Today, solar offers nearly 10,000 megawatts of power. Renewable resources in California can now generate 20,500 megawatts, roughly 29 percent of the state’s energy generating total and enough to power 20 million homes.
Greenlee explained that while the state should have enough power capacity to meet its needs, supplies still will be tight, and conservation needed. Where a power plant is physically located can dictate how effectively and efficiently electricity can be delivered to where it’s needed, and congestion on the power lines can limit the ability to do that.
Sweeney said, it’s wise to heed warnings to cut back power during peak demands.
“This is not a time to panic,” he said. “If everybody does a little bit of their part, we should be OK.”
Staff Writer Lisa Krieger contributed to this report.
Conservation tips from California ISO include:
- Set thermostat to 78° or higher and turn it off when away
- Cool with fans and draw drapes
- Turn off unnecessary lights and appliances
- Use major appliances in morning or late evening
Learn more at: http://www.flexalert.org/
