2020 was the worst year yet for power outages in the US

LAKE ARTHUR, LA - OCTOBER 09: Roberta Palermo, left, the owner of The Bank Hotel, and a hotel guest, right, check their smartphones in darkness due to power outage at the lobby of The Bank Hotel as Hurricane Delta makes landfall on October 9, 2020 in Lake Arthur, Louisiana. | Photo by Go Nakamura/Getty Images

2020 was a record-breaking year for power outages in the United States, according to an Energy Information Administration (EIA) analysis published today. Extreme weather is leaving Americans in the dark for longer than it has in the past, a problem that is bound to get worse as climate change fuels even more violent weather.

On average, a person in the US went over eight hours without electricity in 2020. That’s more than twice as long the average American went without power in 2013, the year that the EIA started keeping track. Across the US, outage times varied considerably. Residents of Louisiana, the state with the longest outages, went a full 60 hours, on average, without electricity last year.

A problem that is bound to get worse as...

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