An approaching ice storm threatens to cut power to millions of people across the eastern two-thirds of the United States this weekend. In the South, where a majority of homes are heated by electricity, losing power means losing heat — a danger that utility officials say ice storms pose more severely than hurricanes.
Electricity heats the majority of homes in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. When ice accumulates on power lines and trees, the added weight brings infrastructure crashing down.
The approaching storm underscores ongoing vulnerabilities in the U.S. power system and exposes disparities in how outages affect communities. Previous storms have left lower-income and minority neighborhoods facing longer disruptions and financial hardship, with energy bill arrears already widespread.
The approaching danger
An approaching ice storm threatens millions of people across the eastern two-thirds of the United States, with particular danger in the South where losing electricity means losing heat. Unlike summer storms that knock out air conditioning, ice storms threaten the survival mechanism itself in regions where electric heating is the standard.
A majority of homes in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia rely on electricity for heat, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Why ice storms are worse than hurricanes
Utility officials in the region are bracing for conditions they regard as more punishing than hurricanes. “I hate ice storms,” said Keith Avery, CEO of Newberry Electric Cooperative in South Carolina. “They are worse than hurricanes.”
Avery’s experience is instructive. Nearly all of his 14,000 customers lost power when Hurricane Helene tore through South Carolina in 2024. But ice storms, he explained, create a different hazard. Ice-coated trees and power lines can continue falling for days after a storm passes. Crews struggle to reach damaged lines on ice-covered roads, and the cold, wet weather takes a toll on workers.
“You get a power line back up and energized, and just as you leave, you hear a loud crack and boom, there’s a tree limb crashing through what you just repaired,” Avery said.
Lessons from Winter Storm Uri
The risks are understood from hard experience. Winter Storm Uri struck Texas in 2021 and crippled the state’s power grid for five days, leading to 246 storm-related deaths according to the Texas Department of Health Services.
The damage from Uri, according to Georg Rute, CEO of Gridraven—a Texas-based firm that analyzes power system risks for grid operators—stemmed largely from poorly weatherized power plants and natural gas systems rather than downed power lines. “The main lesson was to enforce requirements for utilities to be ready for cold weather,” Rute said.
Utilities have since applied those lessons. Yet vulnerabilities remain. Transmission lines can trip during extreme cold, Rute warned.
Preparation and confidence
Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a statement expressing confidence in the state’s readiness. “The ERCOT grid has never been stronger, never been more prepared, and is fully capable of handling this winter storm,” Abbott said Thursday.
Yet Abbott acknowledged the real risk. Ice weighs down power lines and trees fall onto them. Energy providers have positioned crews and equipment for rapid response, he said, and there has been a push to clear trees and branches near power lines in recent years.
Across the Southeast, utilities are mobilizing. Duke Energy, which serves more than 4.6 million customers in North and South Carolina, urged residents to prepare for multiple days without power and positioned more than 18,000 workers for response operations.
The burden falls unequally
Power outages do not affect communities equally. Winter Storm Uri exposed disparities in outage impact. Researchers found that residents in predominantly Hispanic areas experienced more outages, while Black residents were more likely to face outages lasting a day or more, according to Jennifer Laird, a sociology professor at the City University of New York’s Lehman College who studies energy insecurity.
Outages expose dependencies that often go unnoticed until crisis strikes. Medical equipment that requires electricity, infants whose food requires refrigeration, and households without contingency plans face heightened danger. “There are lots of ways that we’re dependent on energy that we don’t realize until a crisis hits — and then it really exposes those vulnerabilities,” Laird said.
Financial vulnerability compounds physical risk. About 1 in 6 U.S. households are already behind on energy bills. With millions expected to turn up their heaters during the cold snap, that number could rise. “A month or two after the storm hits, suddenly the bill hits,” Laird said. “We could see a rise in disconnection notices and disconnections.”
Large systems positioning for impact
The Tennessee Valley Authority, which serves more than 10 million people across seven states, has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in weatherization since a 2022 winter storm and built redundancies to reroute power if lines go down.
“It takes a lot of snow and ice to down one of those big lines,” TVA spokesperson Scott Brooks said.
The approaching storm will test whether that preparedness holds.