HARLINGEN — After about four days of rolling blackouts, AEP Texas’ crews are busy restoring power to more homes after a state agency gave the company the go-ahead to generate more electricity.
Across the company’s service area Thursday morning, 124,000 AEP customers remained without power, down from a peak of about 468,000 on Tuesday morning, spokesman Larry Jones stated in a press release.
“ERCOT is allowing suppliers to release more electricity,” Mayor Chris Boswell said, referring to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages the state’s electric grid. “That should ease things.”
From Wednesday night to Thursday morning, crews restored power to 150,000 homes in the company’s service area, Jones stated.
On Thursday, about 44,000 homes remained without power across the Rio Grande Valley, Eladio Jaimez, an AEP spokesman, said.
“Crews are working and they’re going to be working around the clock until anybody who can take power has power,” he said. “Crews are out there now working to restore all our customers. We don’t have a time frame.”
Company urges customers to conserve power
In the Harlingen and San Benito areas, about 6,000 homes remained without power early Thursday afternoon, Jaimez said.
“AEP Texas crews and dispatchers worked through the night to restore as many customers as we could based on the generation that became available on the grid,” Jeff Stracener, the company’s vice president of distribution region operations, stated in a press release.
Meanwhile, officials are urging customers to conserve power to avoid straining the electric grid during the incoming cold front.
“We are not out of the woods yet,” Stracener stated. “We have some extremely cold weather ahead of us today and tomorrow. If you have power, please continue to conserve your energy usage. Turn off appliances you are not using, turn off lights. Let’s all do our part to make sure we do not put another strain on the grid which could lead to more mandated load sheds and power outages.”
Generators power dialysis centers
Amid the widespread power outages, city and county officials worked to install generators at two Harlingen dialysis centers, Rene Perez, South Texas Emergency Care Foundation’s transport director, said.
“It was imperative they get the life-saving treatment,” he said. “Depending on the condition of the kidneys, when they don’t receive that, they get very sick very quickly over the course of a day or two.”
