The 2024 Extreme Weather Season: A Reminder of our Grid Vulnerability
Back-to-back severe hurricanes, fueled by unnaturally warm ocean water temperatures caused by climate change, have battered the southeastern United States. These intense storms plunged millions of people into power outages and exposed the need for building a modern energy system that is more resilient and incorporates distributed energy, storage, and other measures that help us withstand climate change as it worsens.
There’s no denying the connection to climate change for Hurricanes Helene and Milton. They share similar characteristics, including rapid intensification fueled by record-warm ocean water temperatures. The unusually warmer water increased the wind speed and the precipitation from these storms. Like Hurricane Helene, which intensified from a Category 1 to a Category 4 storm in less than 24 hours, Milton similarly experienced rapid intensification to Category 5 strength due to warmer seas thanks to climate change.
Hurricane Helene caused widespread and severe damage to the electricity grid across the southeastern United States, resulting in millions of power outages and presenting significant challenges for restoration efforts. However, clean energy development provided one bright spot after Helene: Hot Springs, NC kept the lights on for its entire downtown thanks to a solar-powered micro-grid built by Duke Energy in 2023.
Hurricane Helene made landfall late on September 26 and maintained hurricane status until 5 AM on September 27, allowing for an extended period of damaging winds and rainfall. This prolonged exposure to hurricane-force winds increased the cumulative damage to power lines, poles, and other electrical infrastructure. The extended duration of the rainfall was responsible for the widespread flooding.
Over 4.7 million customers lost power across multiple states, with outages particularly severe in North Carolina, Florida, and Georgia.
The storm damaged thousands of power poles, transformers, and spans of wire. Georgia Power reported over 8,300 damaged poles, 21,000 spans of damaged wire (equivalent to 1,000 miles), and 1,600 damaged transformers.
Hundreds of electrical substations were inundated or damaged, complicating restoration efforts.
In some areas, the damage was so severe that crews had to essentially rebuild parts of the grid rather than simply repair it.
Despite the extensive damage, the response was significant:
Over 50,000 utility personnel from 27 states and Washington DC were deployed to assist with restoration efforts.
However, some of the hardest-hit areas, particularly in rural and mountainous regions, faced prolonged outages due to accessibility issues and the extent of the damage.
Helene destroyed grid infrastructure. Some utilities reported over 1000 utility poles broken and in need of replacement.
We can expect to see more storms like Helene and Milton if we continue to ignore the science. Burning fossil fuels for energy creates climate pollution. Climate pollution creates climate change. Climate change increases ocean water temperatures and super-charges powerful storms like Helene and Milton, which damage the grid and cause power outages. We need to break this destructive cycle by moving toward cleaner energy sources. Strengthening and rebuilding the grid to deliver more clean energy will help slash climate pollution and tackle reliability challenges.
The extensive damage and prolonged restoration efforts after Helene highlight the vulnerability of the electricity infrastructure to extreme weather events and underscore the need for continued investment in grid modernization that is clean and climate-resilient.
