Hurricane Helene causes over 4.7 million power outages across Southeast US

Nearly 4.7 million customers were without power across the Southeastern US Sept. 27, after Hurricane Helene made landfall as a Category 4 storm, crossed the Florida Big Bend region and moved over east central Georgia, with utilities assessing damage and working to restore electricity.

Helene, which made landfall at about 11:10 pm ET Sept. 26 near Perry, Florida, should continue to weaken and become a post-tropical storm later Sept. 27, the US National Hurricane Center said in an update at 5 am ET.

"Although the system will weaken as it moves over land, the fast forward speed of Helene during the next 12 hours or so will result in a far inland penetration of strong winds over parts of the southeastern United States, particularly over northern Georgia, including strong gusts over the higher terrain of the southern Appalachians," the NHC said.

Florida Power & Light, Tampa Electric, Alabama Power, Georgia Power, Dominion Energy and Duke Energy, as well as the federal public power company Tennessee Valley Authority are utilities in the path of the storm. Duke Energy’s service territory, which spans South Carolina, Florida, North Carolina, Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio, experienced the most outages at 1.63 million by 4:30 pm ET Sept. 27.

Duke Energy did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

Power outages

Outages peaked at nearly 4.7 million around 3 pm ET Sept. 27, but had fallen to about 4.4 million by almost 5 pm, according to poweroutage.us. South Carolina had the most outages at over 1.2 million around 5 pm, followed by Georgia with 930,064 outages, according to poweroutage.us.

Electric cooperatives in Georgia reported outages primarily in south and southeast Georgia, and crews discovered “catastrophic damage” during assessments, according to a Sept. 27 statement from Georgia Electric Membership Corporation. Georgia Transmission estimated over 100 high-voltage transmission lines and over 60 associated electrical substations are currently out of service.

“Outage numbers rose sharply overnight and early this morning as the storm traveled north through the state, causing some of the worst destruction on the eastern side of the storm’s path,” Georgia EMC said in the statement. “In addition to damage to the EMCs’ distribution lines, Hurricane Helene severely damaged high-voltage transmission lines. These transmission lines are a critical piece of the electric grid, as they feed the substations that provide power to EMC distribution lines.”

In addition, North Carolina had 878,342 outages around 5 pm, followed by Florida with 727,800 outages, according to poweroutage.us.

"As part of our restoration process, we need to get people out in the field to safely survey the damage so that we can provide our customers with accurate information," FPL spokesperson Olivia Mckelvey told S&P Global Commodity Insights Sept. 27.

By 6 am ET, FPL had restored power to over 460,000 customers and had 214,000 without power, the utility said in a statement. The restoration workforce numbers more than 10,000 from 23 states.

"Though our system held up well and our team of thousands continues to work around the clock, some of our customers remain without power," FPL President and CEO Armando Pimentel said in the statement. "To them, we have a simple message: We will not stop until your lights are back on."

Power plants in the path

Southern Company's 1.8-GW Joseph M. Farley Nuclear Plant in southeast Alabama is near the storm's path, as are Duke Energy's 2.57-GW Oconee Nuclear Station in northwest South Carolina and Southern Company’s 1.8-GW Edwin I Hatch Nuclear Plant in southeast Georgia. All were operating at or near 100% capacity at the time of publication, with the exception of Hatch-1, which was offline, and Hatch-2, which was operating at 37% power, according to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The Hatch units are stable, Georgia Power spokesperson John Kraft told S&P Global Commodity Insights.

“Our nuclear plants are designed and built to withstand extreme weather conditions, and our nuclear plants didn’t sustain any significant physical damage from Hurricane Helena,” Kraft said. “However, the power grid experienced significant damage from the storm and, to maintain grid stability, we adjusted operations at Plant Hatch. Our broader generation fleet is fully capable of meeting the power demands of our customers -- this is a great example of why a diversified generation mix is so important.”

In addition, TVA's 3.95-GW Browns Ferry, 2.44-GW Sequoyah and 2.33-GW Watts Bar nuclear plants in Georgia are in the path of the storm as it moved inland. Browns Ferry-1 shut Aug. 30 for refueling. Sequoyah-2 has been shut since July 20 for refueling and repairs.

All other units in George were operating at 100% power.

Gas infrastructure

Kinder Morgan's Elba Island LNG export terminal near Savannah along the Georgia coastline “experienced a series of power interruptions” early Sept. 27 and was in the process of resuming operations, Kinder Morgan spokesperson Melissa Ruiz said.

"Beyond that, the facility was not damaged by Hurricane Helene," Ruiz said.

The terminal -- by far the smallest of the seven major US LNG terminals in operation -- was scheduled to receive 315 MMcf/d of feedgas on Sept. 27, compared with over 390 MMcf/d over the previous three days, according to Commodity Insights data, based on nominations for the morning cycle that could later be revised.

In the US Gulf of Mexico, personnel remained evacuated from a total of nine production platforms, or just under 2.5% of the offshore total, down from over 27 platforms, or 7% of the total, just one day prior.

About 24% of crude oil production and more than 18% of natural gas output from the Gulf of Mexico also remained shut-in as of Sept. 27, according to the latest update from the US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement.

Production from US offshore gas fields rebounded to 1.5 Bcf/d on Sept. 27, up nearly 100 MMcf on the day, but still down about 170 MMcf/d from a late-September high. From June 1 to date, Gulf of Mexico gas production has averaged about 1.75 Bcf/d, according to data from Commodity Insights.

Onshore, the remnants of Hurricane Helene, which moved over Kentucky as a tropical depression in the afternoon, continued to bring cooler weather to the US Southeast, dropping gas-fired power demand to about 11.1 Bcf/d Sept. 27, down just over 500 MMcf on the day.

According to a short-range forecast, regional power demand will continue falling through the upcoming weekend, bottoming out around 10.6 Bcf/d on Sept. 28. Over the past seven days, Southeast power burn has averaged over 12.3 Bcf/d, according to data from Commodity Insights.

Cash markets along the US Gulf Coast were little changed on the day on Sept. 27. At the US benchmark Henry Hub, spot gas prices dropped about 10 cents to $2.53/MMBtu. Prices were still up about 30 cents from the prior-weekend settlement, according to data from Platts, part of Commodity Insights.

FEMA response efforts

The US Federal Emergency Management Agency provided an update on response efforts in a Sept. 27 media call that included officials from various other federal agencies.

The Department of Energy’s Ken Buell said his department had been working closely with industry partners since Sept. 23 and that, as of 11:30 am ET, there were more than 50,000 utility personnel from 27 states and Washington DC ready to assist with power-restoration efforts across the southeast US.

“[We’re] very well-positioned to begin the damage assessment and restoration of power as the storm passes through the area,” Buell, the deputy director for response and restoration, said at the DOE’s Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security and Emergency Response. “As the damage is being seen and know, those resources are being applied where they need to be applied.”

Buell, however, said his office does not have “a global estimated time of restoration of power,” and that the speed at which the crews can proceed will depend on the conditions. Buell and other officials on the call said multiple counties in the impacted areas had more than 80% of residents without power.

“Through many areas, we are waiting for the storm to pass,” Buell said. “The utility crews cannot safely operate in winds over 30 mph or in heavily flooded areas or in areas where debris is preventing access. So, we’ll continue to work with our partners on all of those issues.”

National Weather Service Director Ken Graham said Helene was notable in how long it remained a hurricane, making landfall late Sept. 26 and keeping hurricane status until 5 am Sept. 27.

“That’s six hours of still a hurricane doing quite a bit of damage into Georgia, as well,” Graham said. “The tropical storm-force winds were sustained all the way to upstate South Carolina. This is really just an amazing extent of the winds in the storm, and several times the force extended 350 miles or so away from the center, which is pretty staggering.”