LIPA and PSEG Long Island Adopt Supplemental Standards to Affirm Fairness, Transparency and Local Control

The Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) and PSEG Long Island announced plans today to voluntarily adopt supplemental standards to affirm fairness, transparency, and local decision-making for qualifying major construction projects.

Together, LIPA and PSEG Long Island have and will continue to meet all legal and regulatory requirements for new construction. This Policy, which earned praise from diverse organizations, incorporates long-standing statewide standards for the evaluation of incremental costs and benefits of underground transmission alternatives. LIPA and PSEG Long Island, working with the Department of Public Service, will assure that this information is available to local officials and stakeholders.

The LIPA Board of Trustees will consider the Policy at its September 27, 2017 meeting and is accepting public comment until that time.

“LIPA and PSEG Long Island are affirming the values of fairness, transparency and local control in making aesthetic decisions related to construction projects. A consistent, statewide standard will determine whether projects should be overhead or underground and give local communities the opportunity to go beyond those statewide standards. Any community that wants to make a local aesthetic choice should have the opportunity to do so provided they pay the incremental cost of underground construction. That’s fair to all of our customers and helps keep electric rates affordable.” said Tom McAteer, Vice Chair of the LIPA Board of Trustees.

“As we invest a record $2.8 billion in a more reliable and resilient electric grid for Long Island, LIPA and PSEG Long Island want to assure our customers that each project is evaluated fairly for aesthetic and other considerations. For communities that want to go beyond those standards at their own expense, we will make financing tools available to fund the incremental cost of underground construction locally” said Tom Falcone, LIPA CEO.

The LIPA Board’s Policy includes:

• Completing an “advantage-disadvantage” analysis for qualifying transmission projects to evaluate underground versus overhead construction alternatives. The parameters of this analysis would be the same as those used by the state’s other major utilities, and the analysis would inform PSEG Long Island in meeting LIPA ’s statutory and regulatory requirements, as well as provide additional information to stakeholders on the relative costs and benefits of underground construction.
• Conducting public outreach in advance of the construction of major projects in accordance with a manual of best practices mutually agreed upon by LIPA, PSEG Long Island, and the Department of Public Service.
• Maintaining a local underground construction financing program that permits communities to finance at their expense the additional cost of underground construction if a proposed project does not meet the fair, statewide criteria for undergrounding at systemwide cost.

County Executive Steve Bellone said, "LIPA's policy offers local communities more information on costs and visual concerns prior to major utility upgrades"

“The underground policy from the LIPA affirms consistency and uniform standards for underground electric service construction while providing the community additional information and addressing local concerns.” said Daniel Eichhorn, PSEG Long Island’s incoming President and Chief Operating Officer.

“A standardized process with outreach to affected communities, officials, and civic leaders ahead of construction of transmission and distribution lines, as well as providing benefit-cost analyses makes sense,” said Gordian Raacke, Executive Director of Renewable Energy Long Island. “We commend LIPA and PSEG Long Island for developing a draft policy and making it available for public review and comment before adoption.”

Mitch Pally, Chief Executive Officer of the Long Island Builders Institute (LIBI) said, “LIPA's policy creates a level playing field and uniform standard on underground construction that will not increase cost for all customers to benefit an individual community that looks to underground lines. This policy eliminates confusion on where it's appropriate to underground on Long Island by making the New York State standard the Long Island standard.”

“USGBC-LI appreciates LIPA and PSEG Long Island recognizing and listening to communities with enhancements to better assure a transparent, smart, and responsible plan to address local concerns, maintain high reliability in a consistent and fair manner for individual communities and all customers,” said Sammy Chu, Chief Innovation Officer for Unites States Green Building Council, Long Island Chapter.