JAN 18: Electricity was shut off to parts of California on Wednesday as electricity demand overwhelmed supplies, triggering rolling outages in a desperate bid by power companies to avoid toppling the overloaded grid."We've asked for rotating outages in the PG&E territory," said a spokesman for the California Independent System Operator (ISO), which manages most of the state transmission grid.Pacific Gas and Electric Co. serves about 13 million people in Northern and Central California.ISO officials warned the blackouts, which cut electrical service to entire neighbourhoods for about an hour at a time, could last through the evening.ISO president and chief executive Terry Winter told a news conference the outages would likely to spread to Southern California around 4:30 pm to 5:00 pm Pacific time, when power demand hits the evening peak, if emergency supplies and conservation did not free up more power before then.Without the extra juice, ISO officials warned they might have to order blackouts again on Thursday and Friday.Winter said the outages would probably hit Los Angeles, even though the state's biggest city gets most of its electricity from the Los Angeles department of water and power, an independent municipal power company.This is the first time statewide blackouts have ever been ordered in California. The San Francisco Bay area was hit with rotating outages last June 14 when a heatwave sparked heavy air conditioning demand, outpacing what generators could supply.A Pacific Gas and Electric Co official said the first wave of outages cut service to about 200,000 customers in towns and cities throughout Northern California.The ISO blamed the worsening power crunch on a lack of hydroelectricity and high demand due to cold weather throughout the western US and asked the state's 34 million residents to cut back on power use wherever possible.The problem has been building for months, with California's rapidly growing population and booming economy giving the state a voracious appetite for electricity while almost no new power plants have been built in the state for the past 10 years.In addition to depleted hydropower supplies in California and the Pacific Northwest due to a lack of rainfall and snow, the emergency Wednesday was exacerbated by the reluctance of power marketers to sell electricity to the state.Pacific Gas and Electric, a unit of San Francisco-based PG&E Corp., and Edison International's Southern California Edison are struggling to fend of bankruptcy because they are rapidly running out of money. A state deregulation law blocks them from passing on soaring wholesale power costs to their customers.Together, the two utilities serve about 24 million Californians.
