Electric Power Rationing?
Question:Every evening at 11:32 p.m. our lights go dim. At 7:32 a.m., they brighten again. This happens at exactly the same times every day. It seems like the electrical supply is intentionally being decreased by our power company. My question is, is this possible? Is it legal if it is happening? and will this damage our appliances and other electrical equipment?
Please, serious responses only.
Answers:
Brown outs usually do not happen in the middle of the night. Also they would not happen night after night without public notice. You are probably being affected by a number of factors. It could be a neighbor. Big industrial customers or mines sometimes have huge power demands. Some of these customers can affect the power for over a hundred miles. If you live in a high rise apartment building you might look to see if they are doing something automatically. Since the change is exactly 8 hours in duration it is unlikely to be a malfunction. Because of the exact timing I would say it is a large industrial customer doing some automated process. You can call the utility and ask them to give you a 24hr voltage reading. This is not easy but it can be done. They then can start looking for the cause. The sad thing is that there may be little they can do for you. Sorry, but that is just the physics of electricity.
It is called a 'brown out' and it is perfectly legal and it should not harm your appliances.
It is used to help ration electrical power in areas that are running short. If your area is in a drought zone or in the desert that may be why.
You can call your electrical power provider and ask why. They will be able to tell you exactly why.
Hope this helps. :)
If you call your power company to report this, I am sure that they will explain what is going on. Since most people are sleeping during those hours, it is not unusual to do this due to high ususage during the daylight hours. Electricity costs money to produce, they are trying to cut back on expenses too.
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