Published: August 01, 2006 11:51 pm            

Heat prompts record energy demand

Utilities urging customers to conserve electricity to avoid overtaxing power grid

INDIANAPOLIS — Withering heat that’s broken energy usage records prompted Indiana’s utilities Tuesday to urge their customers to conserve electricity to avoid overtaxing the region’s power grid.

The Midwest Independent System Operator, a Carmel-based power grid monitor that oversees power transmission to some 16 million households in several states, issued a level 2 energy emergency alert Tuesday directing its member utilities to ask consumers to conserve power.

MISO spokesman Gary Rasp said the alert was needed following record energy use among the 15 states and Manitoba for which it oversees power distribution. He said MISO’s system saw record demand Monday of about 136,520 megawatts, breaking a record set just two weeks ago.

Under the level 2 alert — the second-highest in a three-tier alert system — MISO has curtailed its export of power from MISO’s region. It’s also asked its member utilities to maintain adequate reserves and make all of their energy generation available to meet demand.

“We’re basically keeping it within our region because we need it here, right now,” he said. “We don’t want to tax the system any further than we can since generation is already tight.”

On Monday, the state’s largest electric utility, Duke Energy, reported record electricity use of 6,602 megawatt hours. The Northern Indiana Public Service Co., also set a record energy demand, with customers consuming 3,279 megawatts of electricity on Monday.

Duke, NIPSCO and Indiana’s other utilities are advising residents to, among other things, delay using appliances like dishwashers, clothes washers and dryers until nighttime. Residents are also being urged to use lighting sparingly because bulbs add to a home’s heat.

“When people come home from work they typically crank up the air conditioning and start cooking dinner or doing their laundry or using the dishwasher. We just asked the utilities to in turn ask their customers to conserve power,” Rasp said.

Indiana remained under a heat advisory on Tuesday due to temperatures expected to reach into the lower to middle 90s — readings that when combined with high humidity created heat index values in the 100-110 degree range.

The sultry conditions haven’t just left residents drenched in sweat — they’ve also brewed up dense, lung-choking air that’s taxing the respiratory systems of the elderly, children and those in ill health.

Residents across northern Indiana, including South Bend and Fort Wayne, have faced high levels of ground-level ozone — an irritating gas released by cars, lawnmowers and factories that cooks under the summer sun, helping to form smog.

State environmental officials have warned residents in seven northern Indiana counties to not overexert themselves while the heat lingers and the air remains tainted with pollutants that makes breathing difficult for the elderly, children and people with respiratory illnesses.

Karen Belcher, a spokeswoman for Parkview Hospital in Fort Wayne, said that since Saturday about 20 percent of the hospital’s patients have been individuals with chronic health conditions such as respiratory and heart ailments.

“About a half dozen people who came in yesterday complained about the hot and heavy air. They were weak, dizzy, faint and dehydrated, and some were short of breath,” Belcher said.

With a heat index forecast to reach 110 degrees on Tuesday, the St. Joseph County Board of Commissioners declared a State of Emergency through Wednesday evening. The cities of South Bend, Mishawaka, and Elkhart, meanwhile, opened cooling centers to help people endure the heat.

Dr. Kenneth Elek, who works at the E. Blair Warner Family Medicine Center in South Bend, said the sultry conditions has been particularly hard on his patients with pre-existing respiratory conditions.

“I’ve just been telling them to slow down and stay cool,” he said.

The Indiana Department of Environmental Management issued air quality advisories on Monday and Tuesday for Allen, Elkhart, Huntington, Lake, LaPorte, Porter, St. Joseph counties, urging residents with heart or lung conditions to avoid outdoor work or exertion.

The air quality advisory was expected to be lifted Wednesday for those counties because winds from an approaching front are expected to sweep away the stagnant conditions, said Rob Elstro, an IDEM spokesman.

However, the poor air was shifting to the south, with IDEM issuing an air quality advisory for Clark, Floyd and Jackson counties in southeastern Indiana.

        

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