Electric Companies Under Review After Irene

The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities (DPU) will conduct a review of actions by National Grid and NSTAR in the wake of Tropical Storm Irene. The goal of the review is to examine lessons and consider improvements during storm events.

According to a statement from the DPU, the review is in response to customer and municipal concerns. Efforts to restore power will be the focus, and investor-owned electric distribution companies National Grid and NSTAR will be examined. In addition, the DPU will review the communication between the electric companies and affected communities.

Also under review are Emergency Response Plans of the companies, which were filed with the DPU in May 2011. As a matter of course, the DPU requires all four of the utilities (National Grid, NSTAR, Massachusetts Electric Company and Unitil) to submit a 30-day post-storm report. In that report, the DPU will be requiring that each of the utilities include a section on lessons learned and specifically suggest recommendations that will help them improve performance for the upcoming winter store season. The DPU noted that WMECO and Unitil successfully restored power to customers within 48 hours.

“While we understand that Tropical Storm Irene was a rare and severe storm that resulted in hundreds of thousands of outages, the DPU wants to make sure that the utilities restored electric service in a timely and reasonable manner,” said DPU chairperson Ann Berwick. “The DPU’s review will also examine companies’ communications with state and local public officials, and dissemination of information to the public, including updates on when power might be restored.”

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