The two storms Johannes and Anna have caused major problems in southern Norrland, not least for the power supply.
For the cooperative general store in Åmot in Ockelbo municipality, the storms have also been a heavy financial setback.
Groceries worth a purchase price of approximately SEK 73,000 have been lost, according to assistant store manager, Caroline Remula.
"We lost power last Saturday (December 27) and were without power for three days. To save our fresh produce, we loaded dairy and meat products onto a trailer and drove to a nearby business that had the right temperature in their garage," she says.
"It was a lot of work to empty all the refrigerators, but we saved them. The frozen food couldn't be saved. We had nowhere to put it, so it thawed and we had to throw it all away."
Hoping for support from shoppers
The lost revenue means that there is now a risk the Tempo store will be forced to close, even though the power eventually came back on.
"Now people have heard that we have been affected and many who have been snowed in have come here from other places and shopped in support. So we hope that people will continue to do that and that we can get back on track," says Caroline Remula.
At its worst, tens of thousands of customers were without power in the region. At lunchtime on Wednesday, according to Ellevio, this involved around 900 households - some of which had been without power for over a week.
At the same time, many lines have been weatherproofed since the storm Gudrun hit in 2005, notes CEO Johan Lindehag, who visited one of the affected areas outside Ockelbo on Wednesday.
"It obviously doesn't help the customers who are without power now. But the consequences would have been much greater if it had happened in 2005," he says.
Minister of Energy and Enterprise Ebba Busch (KD), who was present at the visit, is on the same page.
"If you look at the last 20 years, we have buried an extremely large number of cables. But it is also expensive - people notice it in their electricity bills if nothing else," she says.
“Constant stress”
When storm Johannes hit, the area was still bare ground. Since then, however, there has been heavy snowfall - and new power outages.
It is a cause for concern, says Caroline Remula in Åmot.
"We know we're at risk, so the store manager has an app where she constantly keeps track of the temperature in the refrigerators and freezers. It's a constant stress," she says.
