Reliability Report: Two Utilities Improve

Electric utilities are devoting more resources—and more press releases—to their reliability programs:

Florida Power & Light noted that its Reliability 2000 program, which began in 1997, has helped it improve “the quality and reliability of service to its customers” to the point where it now ranks in the top 20 percent of U.S. utilities. The average time a customer is without power was 70 minutes in 2000; in 1997 it was 137 minutes.

FPL claims that it has spent $450 million to upgrade its electricity-distribution system since 1997. More than 3.4 million feet of underground cable has been replaced or upgraded; 245 main distribution power lines have been built. An additional 2 million feet of underground cable are planned for 2001.

Commonwealth Edison: The Chicago-area utility notes that it took 273 minutes to restore outages in December 1998, and in 2000 it took 145 minutes. After serious problems occurred in the summer of 1999, Com Ed committed $1.5 billion to upgrade its maintenance and infrastructure. As of September 2000, the company claimed, it completed 27,000 maintenance projects to its distribution lines.

From Pure Power, Summer 2001.

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