Golden Valley Electric Association bumped its Energy Emergency Alert up to Level 1 at 8:15 this morning, Tuesday, Oct. 20. Level 1 means available generation reserves have dropped below 38 megawatts and aren't expected to bounce back within a couple of hours, so GVEA is asking members to conserve electricity where it's practical. Nobody is being asked to prepare for outages at this level. See the current alert on GVEA's site.
Our take: this is the easy level, and the asks are pretty painless. Hold off on the dishwasher and the dryer for a bit, nudge the thermostat down a couple degrees if you're comfortable, skip the space heater if you don't really need it, and put the block heater on a timer instead of leaving it plugged in all day. If you've got a woodstove you trust, today's a good day to light it. With snow falling and the Fairbanks area under a winter weather advisory until 4 p.m. Wednesday, a slow evening at home sounds about right anyway. You can also look back at our post on GVEA's first alert last week for how the levels work.
When the snow wraps up, Good Hand Co. can line up snow removal in Fairbanks so you're not shoveling out the driveway on your lunch break, and handyman help for that drafty door that makes the furnace work overtime. And if the house could use a good deep clean before the holidays, The Alaska Cleaning Company will put together a quote for you.
Photo: the Healy Power Plant, which helps power Fairbanks, in April 2019. By Craig Talbert.jpg), CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.