A Salem Electric crewman works to repair a power line in west Salem on Sunday, Feb. 14. (Ron Cooper/Salem Reporter)
Update, 4:50 p.m. – Portland General Electric said 90% of Oregon customers without power will be restored by Friday night, one week after many in the Salem area saw the lights go out.
“For the remaining 10%, due to the significant damage and access challenges, we expect that it will take several more days,” Larry Bekkedahl , PGE vice president of grid architecture, integration & systems operations, said in a statement.
Original story:
Portland General Electric has finished repairing substations damaged in ice storms over the past week and has nearly completed repairing transmission lines.
Those efforts will speed the push to restore power to the approximately 150,000 customers in Oregon with lights out, said Maria Pope, PGE’s chief executive officer, in a press call Wednesday. But company officials said they still can’t provide estimates for when people can expect power to return.
As of 1:10 p.m. Wednesday, Marion County had 46,730 PGE customers without power, and Polk County had 1,544, according to the company’s outage map.
“We are fully focusing our efforts on repairing or distribution feeders and lines, to be able to get power from our generation sources to homes and businesses. We are prioritizing public safety, and infrastructure repairs to hospitals, elder care homes critical services, including water treatment facilities, and then we will turn our attention to restoring the largest number of customers at a time,” Pope said.
The company has restored power to 490,000 customers since the storms began last week, Pope said, but has been challenged by further ice damage and falling trees at times knocking power back out after restoration.
PGE has a new page on its website for people to see how many crews are working in their area and get answers to common questions.
-Rachel Alexander
