Equipment failure causes power outages in Montreal as freezing temperatures persist

Thousands of Montrealers woke up with no power on Jan. 21, 2025 after an equipment malfunction on one of the coldest days of the winter.

Thousands of Montrealers woke up this morning to no power on one of the coldest mornings of the winter so far.

Hydro Quebec says it was because of an equipment malfunction but the timing couldn’t have been worse.

At its peak, nearly 100,000 homes in the Ahunstic-Cartierville, Villeray and Rosemont had no power. About 20 schools were affected, and six were forced to stay closed for the day.

“We sent a team to see what was the equipment failure at the substation. And it’s a failure with a transformer,” Lynn St-Laurent, a Hydro-Quebec spokesperson, explained.

To restore power in frigid temperatures Hydro Quebec workers had to work fast and reroute the electrical load to other transformers.

“And so that’s been effective as well. We’ve seen many homes get the power back,” St-Laurent said in the afternoon.

By early afternoon, roughly 7,000 customers were in the dark. But the power outage came as the city is in the middle of a cold snap.

The power utility says there’s been an increased demand on the system and they’re anticipating even more demand on Wednesday.

To reduce the pressure on the system, customers should avoid using over-consumption during peak hours, between 6 and 9 a.m. and 4 to 8 p.m.

Hydro Quebec advises turning down the heat in your home by at least 2 C and to limit using hot water during peak hours.

It also recommends residents limit using major appliances like dishwashers and dryers and drivers should also charge their electric vehicles overnight.

Hydro Quebec says it’s not clear what caused the transformer to malfunction in the first place but an investigation is underway.