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What is a power outage and what to do

Important information to help you prepare for and safely manage a power outage.

What is an outage

An outage occurs when electricity stops being supplied to an end-user, such as a home, a business, or an entire area. There are many reasons why an outage would occur. These can be known issues such as when hot weather adds extra pressure on the grid, to unexpected issues that happen without notice, like powerlines falling.

There are different types of power outages that can occur, including:  

  • planned outages, which happen when energy companies need to turn off the power for maintenance or upgrades
  • unplanned outages, which occur unexpectedly due to things like storms, equipment failure or accidents
  • rolling blackouts, where power is intentionally turned off in different areas for short periods to prevent the grid from being overloaded. This may be referred to as load sharing or load shedding.

During an energy emergency, power may have to be turned off to some areas, known as load sharing and load shedding, until the grid has been stabilised. This happens rapidly and customers will not be notified before they occur.

What to do if a power outage occurs

You can take important steps to prepare and stay safe when a power outage occurs.