Power outage history
Wharton County Texas
36hours
without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025
12th most of 240 in Texas 5.4× 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 Wharton's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.
Year by year
Hours in the dark, per customer
2021 was the worst well-recorded year, at 4.7 days for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.
Wharton, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feb 14, 2021 | Winter storm | 23,775 | 100% | 5.2 d | 27 h | 1.1M |
| Jul 8, 2024 | Hurricane Beryl | 15,144 | 64% | 7.3 d | 34 h | 901k |
| Sep 13, 2021 | Hurricane Nicholas | 23,775 | 100% | 5.0 d | 2.3 d | 625k |
| Jun 21, 2023 | No storm report | 23,775 | 100% | 4.1 d | 37 h | 424k |
| Jun 8, 2023 | No storm report | 23,775 | 100% | 2.9 d | 20 h | 269k |
| Jan 24, 2023 | No storm report | 8,859 | 37% | 3.3 d | 45 h | 135k |
| Oct 28, 2021 | No storm report | 14,819 | 62% | 44 h | 9.8 h | 90k |
| Aug 10, 2022 | No storm report | 14,552 | 61% | 27 h | 15 h | 79k |
| Oct 25, 2022 | No storm report | 10,414 | 44% | 16 h | 9.2 h | 71k |
| May 12, 2023 | No storm report | 3,466 | 15% | 2.3 d | 15 h | 58k |
| Jun 4, 2023 | No storm report | 5,782 | 24% | 31 h | 29 h | 56k |
| May 18, 2021 | No storm report | 6,161 | 26% | 28 h | 16 h | 45k |
| May 27, 2023 | No storm report | 2,036 | 9% | 2.3 d | 2.1 d | 43k |
| Dec 22, 2022 | No storm report | 2,153 | 9% | 2.0 d | 4.0 h | 39k |
| Nov 9, 2022 | No storm report | 1,235 | 5% | 2.5 d | 7.2 h | 35k |
| May 28, 2021 | No storm report | 5,897 | 25% | 19 h | 14 h | 34k |
| Apr 10, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 5,297 | 22% | 18 h | 12 h | 31k |
| May 22, 2022 | No storm report | 3,370 | 14% | 16 h | 9.8 h | 27k |
| May 16, 2024 | No storm report | 3,153 | 13% | 47 h | 8.0 h | 27k |
| Nov 4, 2022 | No storm report | 4,646 | 20% | 16 h | 8.8 h | 26k |
| Oct 27, 2021 | No storm report | 4,585 | 19% | 14 h | 6.5 h | 22k |
| Dec 18, 2021 | No storm report | 1,966 | 8% | 22 h | 21 h | 21k |
| Aug 18, 2022 | No storm report | 3,826 | 16% | 28 h | 6.5 h | 20k |
| May 13, 2024 | No storm report | 3,199 | 13% | 21 h | 14 h | 19k |
| Jan 8, 2022 | No storm report | 2,014 | 8% | 23 h | 19 h | 18k |
| May 25, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 4,413 | 19% | 14 h | 7.2 h | 17k |
| Jan 4, 2023 | No storm report | 957 | 4% | 44 h | – | 17k |
| Nov 19, 2022 | No storm report | 938 | 4% | 47 h | – | 17k |
| May 23, 2021 | No storm report | 1,107 | 5% | 27 h | – | 15k |
| Jun 27, 2022 | No storm report | 4,246 | 18% | 8.0 h | 6.2 h | 15k |
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 Wharton from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.
- No storm on record 51%
- Tropical storm 27%
- Winter storm 20%
- Thunderstorms 1.1%
Who keeps the lights on
Utilities serving Wharton
As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole Texas territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.
| Utility | Type | Outage min / yr | Excl. major storms | Outages / yr | Residential ¢/kWh | Customers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jackson Electric Coop, Inc | Cooperative | – | – | – | 14.6 | 16k |
| Wharton County Elec Coop, Inc | Cooperative | – | – | – | 14.2 | 5.6k |
| CenterPoint Energy | Investor Owned | 193 | 151 | 1.95 | – | – |
| AEP Texas Central Company | Investor Owned | 205 | 155 | 1.76 | – | – |
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.
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 23,775 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 →