The following statement comes directly from CenterPoint Energy.

UPDATE: The Texas electric system is facing an unprecedented power shortage situation due to the extreme winter weather impacting the entire state, including Houston and the region.  Texans’ electricity consumption needs have far surpassed current power generation.

Early this morning, ERCOT declared a statewide power generation shortfall emergency and asked electricity delivery companies to reduce load through controlled outages in an effort to bring the supply of and demand for electricity back into balance. 

As CenterPoint Energy made preparations to follow ERCOT’s directive to reduce load, we were anticipating outages of 15 minutes to more than an hour. 

This morning, conditions for power generation were, and continue to be, very serious; ERCOT needs electric companies to reduce their load at a higher level and longer than they originally thought, which in turn is resulting in longer outages for our customers.

Unfortunately, if you are a customer who is currently experiencing an outage, you should be prepared to be without power for at least the rest of the day.

We appreciate our customers’ patience as we continue to follow ERCOT’s directive to reduce load and implement controlled outages across the Greater Houston area.

For all of our customers who do have power, we continue to ask you to conserve power as much as possible to assist with this situation.

As you may know, CenterPoint Energy is a transmission and distribution company and does not generate power, so the shortage of power generation capacity we are facing is not something CenterPoint Energy can directly address. We know this is a very difficult situation for our customers, but we are doing our part, based on ERCOT’s directive, to reach a power supply and demand balance across the state.

We appreciate our customers’ patience and understanding as we do what we can to manage through this significant state-wide power supply situation.