Austin Energy boosts powerline safety for wildfire risk; power restoration may slow

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Austin Energy (AE) said it has activated enhanced powerline safety settings due to an increased wildfire risk in the area.

The safety measure would be active from 9 a.m. until 9 p.m. Sunday, according to the utility.

“During that time, outage restoration may take longer than usual,” AE said.

However, AE said it would not turn off customers’ power, but would adjust system settings to increase safety.

“Enhanced powerline safety settings remove the system’s ability to automatically re-energize after an outage,” AE said. “Instead, crews will physically walk and inspect affected circuits first to make sure equipment is safe to turn back on.”