Power outage history
Guilford County North Carolina
8.2hours
without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025
52nd most of 100 in North Carolina 1.2× the national median
Every day since 2015
Eleven years, one night at a time
Each cell is a day. The brighter it is, the larger the share of Guilford's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.
Year by year
Hours in the dark, per customer
2018 was the worst well-recorded year, at 26 hours for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.
Guilford, hours without power per customer
The record
The biggest outages since 2015
Ranked by customer-hours lost: customers out multiplied by how long they stayed out. Times are local.
| Began | Storm | Peak out | Share | Lasted | 90% restored | Customer-hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 11, 2018 | Hurricane Michael | 95,814 | 36% | 4.9 d | 3.5 d | 5.3M |
| Feb 13, 2021 | Winter storm | 78,544 | 29% | 2.4 d | 43 h | 1.8M |
| Sep 30, 2022 | Hurricane Ian | 50,712 | 19% | 2.0 d | 19 h | 1.1M |
| Apr 15, 2018 | Tornadoes | 29,669 | 11% | 3.0 d | 2.9 d | 853k |
| Oct 29, 2020 | Hurricane Zeta | 40,854 | 15% | 2.1 d | 42 h | 662k |
| Jan 3, 2022 | Winter storm | 25,017 | 9% | 35 h | 31 h | 344k |
| Aug 15, 2023 | Thunderstorms | 20,891 | 8% | 30 h | 30 h | 321k |
| Jan 13, 2019 | Winter storm | 25,888 | 10% | 17 h | 25 h | 209k |
| Dec 9, 2018 | Winter storm | 10,868 | 4% | 26 h | 9.8 h | 188k |
| Dec 24, 2022 | No storm report | 23,600 | 9% | 11 h | 8.0 h | 172k |
| Dec 23, 2022 | No storm report | 19,863 | 7% | 18 h | 28 h | 135k |
| Jul 9, 2023 | Thunderstorms | 19,013 | 7% | 7.8 h | 6.8 h | 108k |
| Jun 17, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 15,436 | 6% | 14 h | 25 h | 92k |
| Sep 27, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 14,531 | 5% | 12 h | 7.5 h | 90k |
| Feb 26, 2015 | Winter storm | 8,359 | 3% | 15 h | 8.0 h | 84k |
| Aug 8, 2024 | Hurricane Debby | 12,818 | 5% | 12 h | 20 h | 75k |
| Aug 23, 2019 | No storm report | 19,413 | 7% | 5.2 h | 6.5 h | 59k |
| Jul 23, 2017 | Thunderstorms | 10,322 | 4% | 6.2 h | 5.0 h | 58k |
| Nov 15, 2018 | No storm report | 3,765 | 1% | 16 h | – | 53k |
| Jul 5, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 10,560 | 4% | 6.8 h | 6.8 h | 53k |
| Jul 26, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 10,703 | 4% | 10 h | 9.0 h | 52k |
| Jul 22, 2018 | Thunderstorms | 8,863 | 3% | 9.0 h | 8.2 h | 47k |
| Jun 30, 2015 | Thunderstorms | 11,967 | 4% | 8.0 h | 8.0 h | 45k |
| Jul 16, 2022 | Flooding | 11,906 | 4% | 4.8 h | 4.0 h | 43k |
| Feb 7, 2020 | Windstorm | 9,998 | 4% | 6.5 h | 8.5 h | 43k |
| May 19, 2017 | No storm report | 6,762 | 3% | 7.0 h | 12 h | 43k |
| Feb 14, 2015 | No storm report | 6,003 | 2% | 11 h | 15 h | 42k |
| Jul 4, 2021 | No storm report | 7,046 | 3% | 6.2 h | 1.2 h | 42k |
| Feb 24, 2016 | Thunderstorms | 8,692 | 3% | 13 h | 6.5 h | 37k |
| Feb 16, 2025 | Thunderstorms | 4,859 | 2% | 9.8 h | – | 34k |
After the peak
How fast the lights come back
Each line is one major outage, from its peak. The amber line is the typical path.
When it happens
The outage clock
Customer-hours out by month (rings, January innermost) and local hour, 2018–2025.
What was happening
Weather behind the outages
Each outage is matched to NOAA storm reports for Guilford from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.
- Tropical storm 55%
- Winter storm 19%
- No storm on record 10.0%
- Thunderstorms 8.2%
- Tornadoes 6.5%
- Flooding 0.9%
Who keeps the lights on
Utilities serving Guilford
As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole North Carolina territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.
| Utility | Type | Outage min / yr | Excl. major storms | Outages / yr | Residential ¢/kWh | Customers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Duke Energy Carolinas, LLC | Investor Owned | 216 | 172 | 1.35 | 13.4 | 2.0M |
| Duke Energy Progress | Investor Owned | 183 | 145 | 1.41 | 15.2 | 1.4M |
| EnergyUnited Elec Member Corp | Cooperative | 169 | 121 | 1.56 | 11.6 | 124k |
| Town of High Point | Municipal | 109 | 86 | 1.39 | 11.7 | 39k |
EIA Form 861, latest year each utility reported. Outage minutes are SAIDI, the yearly minutes the average customer goes without power; outages a year are SAIFI.
Next door
Neighbouring counties
About these numbers
Notes
Outages come from the EAGLE-I record of utility outage maps collected every 15 minutes by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Hours without power are customer-hours divided by the county's 269,628 electricity customers. Averages use well-covered years from 2018. Outages shorter than 15 minutes, and utilities that publish no outage map, are not in the record, so these figures understate the total. How every number is made →