Pa. Saw Record Number of Power Outages in 2024

Pennsylvania electric customers experienced a sharp increase in the number of “reportable outage events” in 2024, a recently released state Public Utility Commission report shows.

The state’s 11 electric distribution companies had 71 outage events in 2024, the highest number on record, and up from 49 events in 2023. The PUC report said that severe storms, damage from trees and vegetation, and an aging power grid continue to be challenges for electric companies across Pennsylvania. More than 2.8 state residents lost power at some point in 2024, up from 1.67 million the previous year.

The majority of the disruptions were caused by severe storms that downed trees and sent overhanging limbs onto power lines. The report urged all of the distribution companies to review and improve their tree trimming and capital improvement programs, and look for new technologies and practices to reduce those risks.

The 2024 Electric Service Reliability Report found that just three of the 11 electric distribution companies met the PUC’s standard performance benchmarks for all categories for both 2024 and rolling three-year averages.

The report noted that “since 2015, and continuing throughout 2024, vegetation has been the number one cause of outages and lost customer-minutes in Pennsylvania. This issue has increased sharply,” as seen in individual companies’ performance. The PUC made recommendations for expanding vegetation management programs to improve tree trimming, as well as exploring more resilient technologies, such as moving lines underground. The PUC also recommended that companies continue to boost their capital improvement and emergency response plans.

“The total number of customers interrupted, customer minutes interrupted, and interruption events all increased significantly in 2024. There had been an overall trend downward for customers interrupted and customer minutes interrupted since 2019,” the report noted. “Hopefully, 2024 was an aberration in terms of the number of outage events due to storms and will moderate in 2025.” But the report also cautioned that companies must prepare for all possibilities, and in April 2025 the region was slammed by a fast-moving storm that brought down trees and power lines and left about 400,000 customers without electricity, some for days.