Council chiefs are preparing for potential power blackouts by getting vulnerable sites ‘priority’ energy status and potentially commissioning their own generators, it’s been revealed.
Russia’s war in Ukraine has led to the supply of gas and electricity becoming more uncertain, sparking concerns for the months ahead when demand for energy inevitably increases. Although unlikely, rolling three-hour power cuts across the region could take place this winter in response to the ongoing energy crisis.
If they are, they would likely take place once a day in the early evening. They would not mean power going off across the entire region at once – and there would be a few days’ notice.
And Oldham bosses have revealed that although the National Grid is not anticipating power cuts, they are putting measures in place for the ‘worst case scenario’ of rolling power outages.
It came in response to a question submitted to full council by Connor Green, who asked what preparation Oldham council was making to deal with possible energy blackouts this winter.
“The government has been war-gaming to find out how the country would deal with energy blackouts for up to a week this winter.”
He asked whether the government had given any money to help keep buildings for vulnerable people running, such as care homes and children’s homes, describing the current picture of energy supply as a ‘precarious position’.
Cabinet member for finance and low carbon, Councillor Abdul Jabbar said: “The council has recently received some guidance from our energy suppliers including including from the National Grid, who are advising that there is no anticipated interruption to energy supplies.
“However, we are still planning to support programmes in case we do see supply issues this winter.
“The worst case scenario is when electricity supplies across the UK would be intermittently turned off in a managed and controlled manner.
“If this occurs, we are reviewing vulnerable sites and registering them via electricity supply emergency code for protected site status, which essentially provides priority energy to registered sites to allow services to continue. Beyond that we are also reviewing provisions for emergency generators to be commissioned.
“Finally, we continue to work with the Greater Manchester Resilience team to review key sites and services to ensure the council can respond to a power outage, should it occur.”
The Greater Manchester Resilience Forum oversees the region’s emergency planning. Chair, Assistant Chief Constable Wasim Chaudhry, says those who are ‘medically dependent’ on electricity – such as people reliant on dialysis or oxygen machines – should already have back-up plans in place.
Electricity North West says it has dedicated people working with the resilience forum to prioritise resources in emergency planning and during incidents.
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