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hydro québec outages

As the Montreal weather begins to cool — with temps reaching single digits and the winter fast approaching — you may be looking for ways to save money on your electricity bill during the colder months. Hydro-Québec shared a number of tips on how to reduce your electricity bill this winter, and putting a few to the test this season could save you more than you'd think.

"It's winter, the colder it is outside, the colder your house gets and the harder your heating system has to work keep to your home at a comfortable temperature, which means you use more energy, and pay more for it, even if you never touch the thermostat," Hydro-Québec said.

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The April 5 ice storm may have been winter's final outburst — at least we can hope. Environment Canada's Montreal weather forecast for the week of April 10 shows temperatures peaking at 20 C or above on three days in a row: Thursday, April 13, Friday, April 14, and Saturday, April 15 — just in time for the scheduled launch of the 2023 BIXI season.

Perhaps more exciting is that nighttime lows aren't forecast to dip below 6 C. On Thursday night, temperatures might remain in the double-digit positives.

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This long weekend is feeling much longer for thousands of people who are still without power across the Island of Montreal. Hydro-Québec confirmed that as of Sunday, April 9 at 10:30 a.m., nearly 80,000 residents across Montreal do not have any power.

Hydro-Québec says that there are a total of 1,248 interruptions across the city — affecting 79,536 customers who remain without any electricity. Similarly, Laval has a total of 316 service interruptions affecting almost 7,000 people out of 198,580.

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While Hydro-Québec crews are busy restoring power lines, Hydro-Québec social media managers have been hard at work, too. They've responded to hundreds of tweets from customers since the April 5 freezing rain storm. Most of those responses consist of updates or links to additional resources. They've also thanked customers for their patience and expressed gratitude for messages of encouragement.

But, as Narcity Québec reports, Hydro's social media team also famously doesn't hesitate to engage with naysayers, often throwing back just as much sass and passive aggression as aggrieved customers lob their way.

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Over 660,000 Hydro-Québec customers still had no power as of 9:30 a.m. Friday, almost two days after a freezing rain storm battered the province. Just over half (340,532) of the remaining households without power were in Montreal.

Powerless hydro clients still numbered in the tens of thousands in five other regions, too: Montérégie (95,530), Laval (80,403), the Laurentides (58,385), Outaouais (54,458) and Lanaudière (33,130).

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Hydro-Québec is hoping to restore power to between 300,000 and 350,000 blacked-out clients by the end of the day on Thursday, April 6, representatives said in a press conference Thursday morning. For some unlucky clients, power issues could extend through Saturday, according to Régis Tellier, the vice-president of operations and maintenance at Hydro-Québec.

Earlier in the day, Energy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon stated that they expect only one-third of affected customers to have power back by Friday morning.

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Despite fallen trees, slippery streets and a mass loss of electricity, Quebec has so far made it through the freezing rain storm without any "major emergency," according to Public Security Minister François Bonnardel. Officials are nevertheless urging caution — and common sense.

Online, Hydro-Québec has a list of safety advice for customers to follow both during and after a power outage. Meanwhile, in Montreal, Mayor Valérie Plante is calling on residents to limit travel outside the home and to keep emergency phone lines open for, well, emergencies.

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Over 1,100,000 Hydro-Québec customers — likely including millions of people — were still without power as of Thursday morning, and the Crown corporation has warned that some might not see the restoration of electricity until the weekend.

Photos circulating on social media show streets littered with fallen trees and power lines following Wednesday's freezing rain storm. But to see the true scale of the damage, look to Hydro-Québec's outage map.

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Hydro-Québec is scrambling to restore power to over 1 million customers provincewide after Wednesday's freezing rain storm felled trees and brought down power lines. In Montreal alone, there were 483,875 customers without electricity as of 7 a.m. Thursday.

Widespread Hydro-Québec outages have also struck the Montérégie (198,386 customers), Outaouais (127,374), Laurentides (108,263), Laval (102,471), and Lanaudière (63,826) regions.

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Hydro-Québec doesn't let snide remarks go unchecked. The Crown corporation's social media pages become an outlet for customer frustration during severe weather-induced mass power outages, like the one that has plagued the province since December 22. As Narcity Québec reports, hundreds of people have taken to the comments sections under the company's update posts. Many have offered messages of thanks and encouragement. Others are less supportive.

While most of Hydro-Québec's replies are helpful and sympathetic, its social media team doesn't hesitate to counter snarky insults with equally snarky retorts. The result is often hilarious.

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Over 130,000 Quebec households and businesses were still without power Tuesday morning following a violent storm that ripped through the province over the weekend. The resulting Hydro-Québec outages affected around 550,000 customers in total, many in the Laurentians, Outaouais and Lanaudière regions, the company said.

1,400 Hydro employees were working to restore power to affected areas as of 5:30 a.m. Tuesday, but some customers are in the dark as to when they might get their electricity back.

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It appears as if your electricity bill will officially be going up today.

As of April 1, 2022 Hydro-Québec will be increasing the rates of electricity by 2.6%. Hydro first announced its intention to increase its rates in a press release back on October 22 and the day has (unfortunately) come.

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