What does the term load shedding really mean? Is it the same thing as a blackout or a brownout?
Load shedding is defined as the removal of pre-selected customer demand from a power system, as a result of the occurrence of an abnormal condition, in a effort to maintain the integrity of the system and minimize overall customer outages. A blackout is defined as the emergency loss of the source of electricity serving an area caused by failure of the generation, transmission or distribution system and a brownout is defined as the partial reduction of electrical voltages caused by customer demand being higher than anticipated or by the failure of the generation, transmission or distribution system, resulting in lights dimming and motor-driven devices slowing down. Source: www.spectraenergy.
