PITTSBURGH — The temperature inside the Pittsburgh CitiParks Homewood Healthy Active Living Center is a comfortable 73 degrees. But just outside of the cooling center...
“It’s terrible. It’s hot out there. It is unbearable,” said Robert Perry of Sharpsburg
Six Healthy Active Living Centers are all being used as cooling centers on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. The Homewood Center’s director told Channel 11 they saw a handful of people on Sunday and more on Monday who either didn’t have air conditioning or lost power.
>>> City of Pittsburgh opening cooling centers for first extreme heat wave of 2025
“That will happen here and there during the heat wave, but we’re not anticipating any widespread outages,” said Matt Neistein of Duquesne Light Company.
Duquesne Light officials said the extreme heat will cause people to run their air conditioners a little bit longer, causing them to work harder in order to match the extreme heat.
>>> DLC warns prolonged heat can lead to power outages, urges public to take action
If your power does go out in a situation like this, when heat is putting strain on the grid, restoration times tend to be a lot quicker than, for example, when severe storms cause fallen trees and down lines, because crews can make repairs a lot quicker.
In the meantime, there are actions you can take to keep your home cooler.
“Close doors to rooms in your house that you may not be using, and really only cool off the spaces you’re actually using – unplug electrical appliances that you may not be using at a given time – use ceiling fans, standing fans if you can,” Neistein said.
Duquesne Light is also asking people to be mindful of their electricity usage, particularly in the middle of the day from 2-6 p.m.
On Monday evening, the company released the following statement:
Duquesne Light Company continues to closely monitor our system amid the ongoing heat wave, and we remain appropriately staffed to safely and effectively respond to any power outages that may occur.
At this time, there have been no major impacts to our electric grid. We will remain vigilant over the coming days as temperatures increase.
Customers should continue to report any outages on DuquesneLight.com, through our free mobile app or by calling 888-393-7100. When possible, the most efficient ways to report outages is online or through the app.
Please note that not all outages displayed on our outage map may be directly related to the heat.
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