Generator powering Broken Hill since severe storm overheated and ...

Some Internet and phone services are down and residents are without power in the far west of New South Wales, as the sole generator being used since last week's wild weather has shut down.

The outage began at 5pm on Monday, affecting Broken Hill and outlying properties.

The large backup generator has been powering the region since Thursday after transmission lines were damaged in a severe storm.

Power infrastructure owner Transgrid's executive general manager Marie Jordan said the generator had overheated and tripped.

"We had anticipated being able to get in and start repairs last night but the actual heat and carbon monoxide inside that generator delayed our ability to even get in and look," she said.

"So we're starting that process this morning."

Ms Jordan said before last week's wild weather there were two generators in Broken Hill but only one was in use after last week's storm. It had been recently serviced.

Generators were used to power Broken Hill after seven transmission towers were damaged in a storm last week. (ABC Broken Hill: Bill Ormonde)

She estimated supply would be restored by Tuesday afternoon, with eight generators expected to arrive today and Wednesday.

"As we get to 5pm every night and the solar rooftop start to back down, conservation could be more critical during this period of time," Ms Jordan said.

"Right now we are trying to put those generators in place, and as soon as those generators come in, we won't remove them from that site until we're sure we have the two generators back up and running."

Six schools in the region are closed today.

In a statement, state-owned company Essential Energy said it would identify "critical sites" to provide backup power to the community until Transgrid could return supply. 

The NSW Rural Fire Service is providing power at town halls at Menindee, Wilcannia and White Cliffs.

Telstra regional general manager Michael Marom told ABC Broken Hill the telecommunications company used generators after a severe storm last week disrupted power.

He said their generators were then "pulled back" after supply was restored.

"We’ve seen a re-occurrence of that AC [alternating current] fail which put us back into step one," Mr Marom said.

“It’s an unfortunate situation, we felt comfortable we’d have continuity of power but unknowing to us, obviously that situation’s changed and we’ve had to redeploy resources into the area."

Transmission lines outside Broken Hill were damaged during wild weather last week. (Supplied: Jodie Pearce)

Mr Marom said Telstra was "redeploying some 20 generators" with priority given to hospitals and medical services.

He said all services should be "up and running" late on Tuesday.

Mr Marom said given Telstra had adequate battery reserves and "a feeling of stability around AC continuity", the company felt it was "prudent " to pull their generators out.

"We work on the information that’s provided to us and the plan as I assume was communicated to the community as well as ourselves was that there was stability of AC power with the use of the gas turbine and that we would have to contend with some load sharing for periods of two hours," he said.

In a statement, the Central Darling Shire Council said Telstra hoped phone services could be restored by 1pm on Tuesday.

Lights out at Broken Hill on Monday night after the town's sole generator shut down. (Supplied: Skye Chan-Mcbeth)

Menindee RFS captain Graeme McCrabb said the town had no power and no working phones.

“I just don’t understand, we run a generator to keep the fridge, the supermarket going, the school and the health service and we can’t install one to keep telecommunications up and going," he said.

“That would be easily serviced and run and fuel maintained … it just beggars belief that simple one hasn’t been addressed."

Outback Pharmacies director Jason Harvey said medication was ruined after a generator powering the fridges at Good Price pharmacy at Broken Hill was stolen overnight.

He said the theft meant some patients would not be able to get their medication on Tuesday.

"Someone has taken it [the generator] … it was pretty well secured too so they've done a good job to get rid of it," Mr Harvey said.

"Everything that's in that fridge is now outside the two to eight degrees [Celsius] that it needs to be safely kept.

"I haven't looked at the damage but there's probably tens of thousands of dollars' worth of medications in that fridge which is going to have to be turfed now."

He says all five local pharmacies were open, but they were operating at a limited capacity as staff would hand-write labels for urgent orders.

"It's not ideal … it's why you've got insurance, but there's some people who rock up to Good Price today expecting to have some potentially critical medication who aren't going to get it today," he said.

"Most things if we order it today, it'll be in tomorrow morning, but that's not always the case."

Seven high voltage power lines were flattened in last week's storm.  (ABC Broken Hill: Bill Ormonde )

Meals on Wheels' Heather Picken said the charity would not be able to deliver more than 170 meals today and Wednesday after their kitchen lost power for more than 14 hours.

"And how many of those people have someone that is going to be able to check on them — we don't know," she said.

"The meals that were prepared to be dished up and served today, we can't take the risk the food is off.

"Even if the power were to come on again this afternoon, nobody's got stock."

NSW Premier Chris Minns said the state's central west had been declared a natural disaster zone and that work was underway to restore power to the region. 

"I want to make it clear that when you have a regional, remote community there must be redundancy power in place, there must be a back-up generator in place," Mr Minns said. 

"One of the two gas fired generators has been inoperable since November, the second one broke down at five o'clock yesterday. That's clearly not good enough.

"Our immediate responsibility is to get electricity back on in Broken Hill but straight after that we'll be ensuring that there's an inquiry as to how this happened so that regional communities know that power will be available when there is a natural emergency."

NSW Energy Minister Penny Sharpe said Transgrid's generators should be connected by Wednesday.

"There's a bit of period where people have to be more patient," she said.

Penny Sharpe has asked for the community to be patient until power is back on. (AAP: Mick Tsikas)

On Monday, the NSW and federal governments announced disaster recovery funding to help local councils with the costs of cleaning up and restoring damaged essential public assets.

"The assistance being activated today will help councils clean up communities as quickly as possible, ensure public safety and reinstate critical assets," Federal Minister for Emergency Management, Jenny McAllister said.

Camping shop owner Kerry Turley said he had sold small generators to families and motels to keep fans and fridges running.

He said butane stoves had sold out, while customers were also requesting torches and backup lamps.

"Latest thing today is running sleep apnoea machines, predominantly they are always 240-volt, no one is getting a good night's sleep," he said.

"So we've got some options for people — how we can convert it to run off a 12-volt battery system."

Pastoralists' Association of West Darling president Terry Smith said most rural properties had their own generators but the outage was inconvenient for shearing and other jobs.

"I think the real frustrating thing is there's no real communication, saying 'we're going to have enough to supply Broken Hill but the outlying areas might have to miss out or there'll be load sharing," he said.

"You obviously can't do much about the weather pattern but certainly they probably need to look at the serviceability of those lines."