COLUMBUS, Ohio — Columbus reached temperatures above 90 degrees Monday afternoon. Residents can expect a lot more of that heat throughout the rest of the week.
The heat wave prompted PJM, the company that controls the flow of electricity to the state, to issue a heat warning across its service area.
“We will maintain a reliable grid throughout the heat from a forecast perspective. We estimate a load of 140,000 megawatts to 149,000 megawatts temperatures starting off in the beginning of the week in the low 90s so no other warning other than the hot weather alert and just as a reminder out all-time peak is 165,00 megawatts.,” said Dave Souder, Executive Director of operations PJM.
If there is a power outage, 10TV asked how AEP Ohio how quickly they can respond.
“Right now, we average about a little under 148 minutes to respond to the average outage," said Ryan Forbes, Vice President of Operations AEP.
AEP said in anticipation of any power failures, it's delaying other work so it will have crews in place.
The power company says it has taken an aggressive approach to cutting down vegetation around power lines to avoid getting tripped.
The power company, which serves more than a million customers statewide, is asking customers to conserve as much energy as they can during the heat wave to help take a load off the electrical grid.
“We understand that during this time we all like our air conditioners to work and if they can simple things like turn the thermostat up a degree it all helps,” Forbes said.
You can get the latest power outage numbers here.