LIPA after Sandy: Hardened grid, upgraded technology

Superstorm Sandy may have been the worst disaster to hit the LIPA electric grid, but the storm’s aftermath brought a wave of changes that included a new system operator, badly needed technology and infrastructure upgrades, and more than $1.4 billion in federal funding to repair and prepare for the next big storm.

By Oct. 31, 2012, Sandy had knocked out power to 945,000 Long Island Power Authority customers, and a subsequent nor’easter would push the total past 1 million. Some 15,000 workers were called from across the country to work on restoring power, with a price tag of more than $700 million.

Tensions ran high. Customers protested in the streets, public officials temporarily commandeered a LIPA substation, and flood damage meant 40,000 homes needed to be inspected before the juice could be turned back on, infuriating customers whose outages lingered for days and weeks.

Sandy’s impact surpassed the biggest storm to hit the grid, Hurricane Gloria in 1985, when 750,000 lost power. LIPA’s acting chief executive and its chairman resigned in the wake of the storm, and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a frequent LIPA critic during the restoration, empaneled a Moreland Commission to investigate the failings.

The panel’s findings resulted in the LIPA Reform Act of 2013, a law that reduced LIPA to 40 employees from more than 100 while giving PSEG Long Island, the new system operator, a greater role than one originally envisioned. (About half of the act involves refinancing LIPA debt through newly issued securities.)

Federal emergency funds not only covered $700 million in storm reparation costs, but in the aftermath another $730 million came LIPA’s way to fortify the grid. The work, which will harden the LIPA system to a level not seen in the utility’s history, is just about half done.

“Work is in progress across the Island and the Rockaways, with projects being completed in literally every town,” John O’Connell, PSEG’s vice president of transmission and distribution, told LIPA trustees recently.

Most of the work is being completed by outside contractors, from Long Island and out of state. Already, O’Connell said, PSEG has hardened 417 circuit miles since the program began last year. The work includes installing thicker poles able to withstand higher wind speeds, replacing wires, and installing new automated equipment called sectionalizers that let the utility shut off sections of the grid affected by an outage.

In addition, nearly all of the 12 substations that were affected by flooding or other damage during Sandy have been elevated and their equipment upgraded and replaced. There are hundreds of substations across Long Island — facilities that step down high-voltage power from plants and other sources to lower voltages used in homes and business. Heavy damage to substations during Sandy was a major setback for the grid, particularly in flood-prone areas such as Long Beach, which experienced the longest outages.

PSEG also completely revamped the system by which it trims branches and other vegetation around distribution poles and wires and around bigger high-voltage transmission lines.

A four-year program started in 2014 has already seen trees and vegetation on 7,739 miles of LIPA’s total 8,800 miles of distribution lines trimmed, with a larger cut away from the lines than LIPA’s previous contractor, National Grid, had done. PSEG has also completed trimming around 950 miles of high-voltage transmission lines.

“We continue to see reductions in outages when we trim branches away from the wires,” O’Connell said.

One of the biggest breakdowns during Sandy was communication — between LIPA and elected officials, businesses and residential customers. During Sandy, LIPA and outside crews were handed paper assignments and maps, and the computer system was based on old computer language.

PSEG early on moved to replace the utility’s old outage management computer system with a more modern one that gives customers more information about outages and restoration times than ever before.

PSEG is also sending customers more alerts, using telephone, email and text message, often in advance of approaching storms, and when the events are over.

“Our efforts revolve around providing more information, better information, and having that information more easy to access,” O’Connell said. Customers can now send a text to report an outage with a single click.

The outage center on PSEG’s website lets customers know the status of the crew working on their outage, the cause, and the estimated time of repair. Customers can also isolate their address and see graphics showing how many other customers in their area are affected by the same problem. The website is available in Spanish.

With bad weather coming, O’Connell said, “We’ll reach out to all customers, not just those who experienced an outage.”

One former LIPA trustee who sat on the board during the difficult Sandy years and transition called the improvements “substantial.”

“We’re seeing a much better system than when that storm hit five years ago,” said Neal Lewis, executive director of the Sustainability Institute at Molloy College. And while many of the improvements came with PSEG and without federal aid, Lewis noted that LIPA’s status as a municipal utility made all the difference in terms of providing dollars to harden the system after the storm.

“The funding from FEMA would not be possible if we didn’t have a public utility on Long Island,” he said. “That is a very real number.”