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Mamdani’s AC warning revealed that NY’s power grid is in big trouble — and it’s a problem he helped cause

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As temperatures hit 100 degrees last week, New York City’s unconventional mayor did something pretty conventional: He urged people to use less electricity.

But when Mayor Zohran Mamdani urged residents to set their air conditioners to 78 degrees (a past practice of both Democrats and Republicans alike), he revealed something far more harmful than the heat index: how much Albany’s policies have driven New York City’s power grid to the point of collapse.

Several factors are at play every summer.

About 90% of homes today have air conditioning; as recently as the 1980s, most didn’t.

Portions of the electric system are extremely old by national standards, and the sheer physics of generating and distributing the appropriate voltage and amperage to every corner of such a dense and diverse cityscape borders on the miraculous.

Tighter ozone-emission rules began taking effect in 2023, forcing about a dozen of the city’s smaller power plants to close — making it even tougher to get juice to every corner.

More From Ken Girardin

Hochul’s biggest failure in her budget deal with NY lawmakers

Progressives cheer as Mamdani robs the future to waste money in the present

Unions’ hidden LIRR-strike scheme aims to pick everyone’s pockets

Recall that the city nearly had rolling blackouts a year........

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