Florida cold snap damages citrus crop, strains power supplies

Florida will endure at least another day of bitter cold that has damaged the state’s citrus crop and prompted a local utility to ask residents to reduce electricity use.

Freeze and extreme-cold warnings and advisories cover the entire state, the National Weather Service said. Jacksonville saw a low of 22 degrees and Orlando fell to 24 degrees on Sunday, both daily records, while Tampa dropped to 29, two degrees shy of its record.

“There was significant damage to the remaining oranges to be picked in central Florida,” said Jim Roemer, a meteorologist who publishes the WeatherWealth newsletter. “Many key areas were well below 28 degrees for over four hours between Sunday and this morning.”

Florida’s citrus industry was already struggling with the long-running effects of greening disease, which is spread by an invasive pest and causes fruits to drop prematurely. The U.S. Department of Agriculture forecast this season’s orange juice harvest would be the smallest since 1930. The deep cold may have permanently damaged some trees in the area as temperatures remained below 24 degrees for four hours, Roemer said.

Still, orange juice futures markets brushed off the risk of damages, dropping as much as 11%, the biggest intraday plunge since 2010.

Growers had already prepared with water sprayers to help insulate oranges, and some unharvested fruits were mature enough to be salvaged, said Judy Ganes, the president of J. Ganes Consulting. The cold weather is expected to help with that, she added.

“They need to get the oranges off the trees and processed before the oranges go soft and rot, so a freeze and fast warm up is more challenging than a lingering cold,” Ganes said.

The cold has also strained power resources across the South. Duke Energy Corp. asked customers in Florida and North Carolina to conserve electricity Monday morning to help avoid power outages. The U.S. Department of Energy told seven Florida utilities they can bring additional power plants online to meet demand as the cold lingers.

Across the U.S., over 138,000 homes and businesses were without power – Mississippi, Tennessee and Florida were the three hardest-hit states, according to PowerOutage.com.

The worst of the cold in Florida should ease after Tuesday, said David Roth, a senior branch forecaster at the Weather Prediction Center. The chill has already led to some unusual events across the state, including reports of snow flurries in Tampa and Fort Myers over the weekend.