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Energy & Renewables vocabulary · Grid, Transmission and Distribution

Power outage

Meaning in energy & renewables, with examples

/ˈpaʊər ˌaʊtɪdʒ/nounCore term

In energy & renewables, power outage means: A period when electricity is not available to customers because of a fault, bad weather, damage to the network or planned maintenance.

In Turkish: elektrik kesintisi, enerji kesintisi

How it is used

Common in customer messages, news and reliability reports. An outage happens, affects customers and lasts hours until power is restored. Planned outages are announced in advance; unplanned outages are not. British English often says power cut.

Example sentences

  1. The power outage affected about 20,000 customers for three hours.

  2. There will be a planned power outage on Sunday for transformer maintenance.

Common collocations

  • planned outage
  • unplanned outage
  • power is restored
  • outage affects customers
  • power cut
  • blackoutA total loss of electricity over a large area, often caused when a major fault spreads through the grid faster than operators can contain it.
  • load sheddingDeliberately cutting power to some areas or customers for a period, usually in rotation, to protect the grid when supply cannot meet demand.
  • distribution networkThe lower-voltage part of the power system that takes electricity from substations and delivers it through local lines and cables to homes and businesses.
  • grid operatorThe organisation that runs the power system in real time, balancing supply and demand and keeping voltage and frequency stable across the network.

More terms: Grid, Transmission and Distribution

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