A little more than 28,000 Hydro-Québec customers were in the dark Monday noon, as a mixture of snow and freezing rain fell on southern Quebec and complicated travel.
It was in Estrie that the greatest number of outages were reported, with more than 19,000 customers deprived of electricity. Some ski hills had to close, including Sutton, Owl’s Head and Bromont.
“Estrie, Chaudière-Appalaches, and Montérégie received good accumulations of heavy snow and are the regions most affected on Monday,” reports Louis-Olivier Batty, spokesperson for Hydro-Québec.
Mr Batty notes that many outages are caused by tree branches coming into contact with the network. “It triggers the protective equipment. These are not always breakages. If the network sees an anomaly, it’s like at home, the circuit breaker trips. Our teams must go and do a visual inspection, cut branches, etc. »
Some 63 teams are deployed in the affected regions, he said.
“We hope by Monday afternoon to have 130 teams, including teams from the Laurentians, Montreal and Quebec. »
Also, 70% of outages affect 50 customers or less, he noted. “The majority of affected customers should have service again before the end of the day. »
16% more breakdowns
Last year, the Auditor General of Quebec, Guylaine Leclerc, noted that Hydro-Québec “is not adequately equipped to face the growing challenge of the aging of its assets.” Consequence: the reliability of its electricity distribution service shows a “marked decline”.
Since 2012, excluding major weather events, “the average duration of outages per supplied customer has increased by 63% and the number of outages is up 16%,” she explained.
The state-owned company noted that it had two priorities that are “crucial” to reduce outages: continuing preventive maintenance of poles and vegetation control activities, responsible for 40 to 70% of service outages.