Pretty standard system of breakers - it's designed to route electricity through different parts of the city and limit the power that goes through the grid. If there's a sudden surge, it just flips off before that power can go through and burn everything it's connected to out.

[ While he talks, he's digging tools out of his toolbox and pulling on a pair of thick gloves. ]

And it's done its job, but we've had these guys down here chewing on the wires, so to speak, so we gotta do a manual restart and try to reroute some of the power to areas that don't have any.

[ ...this may, of course, make absolutely no sense to her. It's okay, Howard doesn't make sense to people from his world half the time. ]