Soaring electricity demands across a fourteen state region caused rolling outages for many utilities and rural co-ops.

Brad Schardin, Manager of Southeastern Electric in Marion, says they found out very early yesterday about the outages..

Schardin says they don’t get any advance warning of the shutdowns…

The Southwest Power Pool, which manages power in those fourteen states is in a level two emergency, calling for power conservation. Schardin says everyone can help cut the demand….

Record cold temperatures hit much of the middle part of the country this week, causing damage to power generation facilities and rapidly driving up demand.