POWER STRUGGLE

Some notable power outages around the world:

July 31, 2012: Three power grids across half of India fail in what authorities call overdrawing of the system, leaving a record 620 million people without power for several hours and raising serious concerns about whether the country’s outdated infrastructure can meet soaring demands.

July 30, 2012: India’s northern electricity grid fails for much of the day, leaving 370 million people without power.

Nov. 10, 2009: Storms near the Itaipu hydroelectric dam on the Paraguay-Brazil border are tentatively blamed for outages that cut power to as many as 60 million people in Brazil for two to three hours. The entire nation of Paraguay, population 7 million, is also briefly blacked out.

January-february 2008: Winter storms cause a nearly two-week blackout to about 4 million people around the central Chinese city of Chenzhou. Eleven technicians reportedly die trying to restore power.

July 12, 2004: Heavy use of air conditioners and other factors are blamed for blackouts affecting at least 7 million people in Greece just a month before the summer Olympic Games.

Aug. 14, 2003: The worst U.S. blackout. Power line problems in the Midwest trigger a cascade of breakdowns that cut power to 50 million people in eight states and Canada, some for more than a day.

March 11, 1999: Lightning hits a power substation in Brazil’s Sao Paulo state, leaving 97 million people without power for as long as five hours. An official says it is linked to transmission lines from the Itaipu dam.