06/02/2026
📌Earlier today (6/2/26), as well as last Friday, HEMC experienced a large-scale outage affecting a significant portion of our system due to a transmission outage on Dominion Energy’s system.
âť“What Caused the Extended Outage
• Dominion currently has significant and important transmission line upgrades being done in the county, and the outage is NOT directly related to that work.
• However, due to those ongoing projects, our system is currently operating on a temporary, simplified one-way configuration.
• This means HEMC is not on its normal transmission feed, which significantly reduces our ability to re-route power (backfeed) from other sources.
• As a result, we are dependent on a single transmission source feeding into the county from the Aulander area.
âť“Why This Outage Was More Impactful
• Under normal conditions, HEMC can shift load between multiple substations to minimize outages, and Dominion has multiple transmission feeds supporting our distribution grid.
• In the current configuration, those options are largely unavailable, increasing both the number of members affected and the duration of the outage.
âť“What HEMC Could Do
• Crews were able to identify a limited backfeed option.
• Approximately 400 accounts were restored through some temporary work to connect one Halifax county circuit to a Warren county substation.
• Full restoration for the majority of members required Dominion to restore transmission service.
âť“Commitment to Our Members
We understand how disruptive this situation was and share your frustration. While the outage originated from the transmission system, HEMC worked diligently to:
• Actively coordinate with Dominion Energy
• Take all available actions within our system to restore members where possible
• Provide updates as new information became available
We appreciate your patience as we worked through this challenging situation.
