Summer is just around the corner. For businesses in arid and/or high temperature environments, that is unwelcome news. With temperatures reaching record highs, many states are still unprepared for it, and — ultimately — that means rolling blackouts. These rolling blackouts have the potential to devastate companies all across the board. Collectively, blackouts cost the country $80 billion per year, and a data center can lose an average of $50,000 per hour during a power outage. Unfortunately, that’s not even the worst of it.

Can People Die From Blackouts?

A surprising number of business owners think so. Upscale restaurants and doctors offices alike have filed for exemptions from the probable rolling blackouts, stating that diners may die from an outage owing to food poisoning and patients may go into cardiac arrest induced by the shock of an unexpected loss of power. Similarly, “Dental offices, cemeteries, churches, beauty salons, hotels, law firms and at least one dance studio are vying for the expected handful of exemptions, all arguing that members of the public could hurt themselves in the dark,” according to The Los Angeles Times. In addition to food poisoning, heart attacks, and fumbling in the dark, “applicants raise the specter of chemical spills, heavy-machinery failures, medical emergencies, and even civil unrest,” the publication continues.

What To Do About It

Exemptions are not the only answer, however. Commercial electrical contracting companies can easily install an uninterruptible power supply, putting an end to all of the disasters supposedly foreseen by these business owners. What’s more, in addition to installing an uninterruptible power supply, many of these companies can also provide a number of related services, ranging from installing security systems to providing critical backup software and backup disaster plans. (Companies can choose from a backup hard-drive, cloud storage — a method adopted by 29% of all business, or both.) That means the same company can keep your patrons, systems, and data safe.

Rolling blackouts can be cumbersome, inconvenient, and (at least some would argue) deadly. Backup power solutions can go a long way to solve these critical problems.