Is Vonbluvens to blame?
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/djf500/200802261723DOWJONESDJONLINE000845_FORTUNE5.htm
MIAMI (AP)--A problem with the electrical grid in Florida caused power outages stretching from Miami up almost to Jacksonville that affected as many as 3 million people Tuesday and caused a nuclear plant to automatically shut down, officials with the state's largest utility said.

Dow Jones Newswires reported that Stan Johnson, manager of situation awareness at the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, or NERC, said the failure of a substation set off the outage. NERC oversees the reliability of the U.S. electric grid.

Substations convert the high-voltage electricity in transmission lines to lower-voltage power that can be used in homes.

Johnson said that at about 1:09 p.m. EST, a substation experienced equipment problems, triggering a power outage throughout Dade County, which includes Miami.

While many areas were hit hard, the outages were generally short and only a few hundred thousand people lacked electricity for the evening commute home, the Associated Press reported..

All power should be restored to Florida Power & Light customers by 5:30 p.m. EST, a spokeswoman for the company said. Florida Power & Light is a unit of FPL Group Inc. (FPL).

The Florida Power & Light nuclear spokesman, Dick Winn, said grid problems caused both reactors at the Turkey Point plant south of Miami to shut down.

"All the safety systems worked just like they were supposed to and both of those units are in stable condition right now," he said.

"There are no safety concerns. The reactors shut down as designed," said Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Kenneth Clark in a telephone interview. He said two coal-burning power plants at Turkey Point about 25 miles south of downtown Miami also shut down.

The outages have no connection to terrorism, Homeland Security Department spokeswoman Laura Keehner said. No foul play was suspected, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Alvarez said.

Florida emergency management officials said the outages cut power to about 2 million to 3 million people.

Outages were concentrated in the southeastern portion of the state, including Miami, but were also reported in the southwestern and northeastern parts of the state as well as in the Florida Keys.