Glendale Power Outage : Power Outages | City of Glendale, CA

Power outages can occur suddenly or be planned for critical maintenance or repairs. Being informed about outages helps keep you secure and ready for when they occur. Our objective is to rapidly and safely restore power.

Why Power Outages Happen

There are a variety of causes for outages, including:

• Mylar balloons are the most frequent source of outages and have been so for the past ten years

• Birds and rodents coming into touch with electrical equipment

• Traffic collisions: When vehicles collide with utility poles, power wires may be destroyed.

• Heat: Excessive air conditioner use can overload electrical lines, transformers, and subterranean vaults.

• Weather: Cable failure due to persistent drizzle, heavy rain, or strong winds

• Falling tree limbs, such as large branches or tree detritus or hefty palm fronds.

• Natural disasters: Fires and earthquakes can harm electrical systems and networks.

• Measures to Prevent Fires: Red Flag Warnings, Potential Hazards, Dry Conditions, High Heat, and Wind

• Outages that have been planned in advance, such as those necessary to maintain infrastructure or prune trees.

Glendale Water & Power

Glendale Water & Power is a distinguished Reliable Public Power (RP3) Award recipient. That means we are really good at providing reliable power, by having fewer outages, quicker restoration times, and maintaining our infrastructure to continue to provide you with reliable power. Glendale Power know outages are frustrating, and the crews are on standby 24-7 to restore power quickly. In fact Glendale Power reliability is unmatched as the response time is faster than most other utilities. Once an outage is reported, Glendale Power team pinpoints the location and cause of the outage and sends out crews to repair.

Below is an infographic and step by step process of how we restore your power:

1. Repair Transmission Lines: High voltage lines that carry power from the city’s power source to substations serving thousands of customers. They rarely fail, but it is possible. Since trouble on a transmission line affects thousands of customers, it gets attention first.
2. Substations: Point where high voltage is lowered to feed distribution lines. If we can fix the issue at the substation, we can get power back on for a large number of customers. Substations act as a distribution and switching station.
3. Distribution or Feeder Lines: Lines that carry power to a large group of customers. This is our second priority. We patrol the individual lines, working our way down the system from the substation. Feeder lines serve 1,000 to 3,000 customers and are usually the lines affected when you hear of a power outage.
4. Neighborhood Tap Lines: Lines that move power from feeder lines to individual streets. They feed pockets of 20-30 homes each.
5. Individual Service Lines: Lines that serve individual homes and businesses. Repairing these lines takes the longest because sometimes damage can occur on the service line between your house and the transformer on the pole. This may be why your neighbor has power, but you don’t.