Michigan Leads the Country for Summer Outages with More than 9,000 Major Disruptions

Article courtesy of Wolf River Electric.

Researchers at Wolf River Electric analyzed major outage data from the Event Correlated Outage Dataset in America, covering summer outages from May through August between 2021 and 2023, the latest data available. The study looked at outages affecting at least 5,000 customers and ranked states based primarily on the number of major outages recorded during that period, while also factoring in average annual outage hours to show where blackouts tend to last longest.

Michigan sits at the top of the list by a wide margin.

The state recorded 9,162 major outages between May and August from 2021 to 2023, far more than any other state in the dataset. It also averaged 47,761 annual outage hours during the summer period, which means not only are outages happening often, they are also adding up in terms of total disruption. For residents, that can quickly turn into repeated short blackouts or longer stretches without power right when demand is highest during hot weather.

Further down the list, New York and Wisconsin also see noticeable summer disruption, with Wisconsin standing out as another northern state appearing near the top of the ranking. Louisiana, Washington, and North Carolina complete the top 10, each recording fewer than 500 major outages but still enough to show consistent summer grid strain.

The full ranking:

Methodology

This study ranked US states most at risk for summer power outages by analyzing data from the Event Correlated Outage Dataset in America (2021–2023). The data includes outage events affecting 5,000 or more customers during the summer months of May through August each year.