PGE restoration complete from severe winter weather

Portland, Ore. – Today, PGE completed restoration for customers affected by the winter storms that began on Jan. 13., which brought high winds, ice and snow to PGE’s service area, causing widespread damage across the region.

Last week’s ongoing winter weather caused multiple rounds of damage across PGE’s service area. Customer outages over the nine days totaled 524,600 with the initial Jan. 13 storm peak at 165,000 customers. PGE crews faced challenging conditions in the field, such as downed trees and icy roads, that delayed access and extended restoration times.

At the peak of PGE’s restoration efforts, approximately 1,800 personnel, including crews and support staff, and mutual assistance crews from across the state, Washington, Idaho and California worked to clear debris, assess and repair downed lines, damaged poles, substations and transmission equipment to restore power. Given the ongoing rain and challenging repair conditions, a small number of outages may persist into this week.

“Last week’s winter storms hit our region, causing extensive, widespread damage, and power outages that affected thousands of our customers. PGE understands that extended power outages are challenging, especially in severe weather, and our crews worked tirelessly to restore service to all affected,” said Ben Felton, PGE executive vice president, chief operating officer. "We certainly appreciate that large, impactful events of this nature provide opportunities for better communications and ongoing improvements.”

The final statistics on the restoration work include:

• Customers restored: over 524,600

• Crews and support staff responding the weather event at peak: over 1,800

• Transmission lines repaired: 23

• Distribution lines restored: 69

• Substations repaired: 14

• Transformers fixed: 599

• Power poles fixed: 348

• Crossarms fixed: 1,333