O&R Replacing Cast Iron Gas Mains in the Hudson Valley

PEARL RIVER, NY — With the successful completion of its current $1.6 million gas main replacement project in Suffern this month, O&R officials announced that the utility has removed all cast-iron pipes, some of the oldest pipe in the gas system, from its Rockland gas distribution system.

They have been replaced with with high-pressure, high-performance plastic gas mains.

The cast-iron removal and gas delivery upgrade to a high-pressure system provides a number of substantial service improvements that mean major safety and reliability benefits to O&R customers, company officials said. Unlike cast-iron — or early-vintage steel mains — the new high-performance plastic mains are corrosion proof, providing substantially more protection against gas leaks. The new, high-pressure natural gas system also provides more flexibility to enhance reliable and safe operation of the gas distribution system.

Today’s announcement represents the completion of the latest phase of a gas main replacement program that between 2003 and 2015 replaced approximately 35 miles of cast-iron gas pipes in O&R’s service area in Orange and Rockland counties, and upgraded those systems from low pressure to high pressure service.

In 2015, O&R replaced 95,000 feet of cast iron and unprotected steel natural gas main with high-performance plastic in Orange and Rockland. The utility plans to replace another 110,000 feet of gas main in 2016, 115,000 feet in 2017 and 120,000 feet in 2018.

The Suffern project replaced about 4,740 feet of cast-iron main and 460 feet of early-vintage steel main with high-performance plastic gas main.

In addition to Suffern, O&R has replaced cast-iron gas pipes and upgraded to a high pressure gas delivery system in Garnerville, Piermont, Haverstraw, and Nyack. O&R plans to finish replacing the remaining cast-iron pipe in Orange County, where it has already begun replacing cast-iron and upgrading the gas system in Port Jervis and Middletown, over the next three years, officials said.

This year, O&R will spend over $20 million in the gas main replacement program. That’s more than half of the capital budget for the O&R gas business.

In addition to the cast-iron and early-vintage steel gas main replacement program, O&R analyzes its entire gas delivery system, 1,858 miles of pipe, each year to target the mains most likely to leak, and these are then scheduled for removal so that the safety of the system can be optimized, officials said.

In addition to cast iron, which is among the oldest pipe in the system, the main replacement program also targets steel mains installed prior to 1971, and mains made of an early vintage plastic material that can be leak prone.

Orange and Rockland Utilities, a wholly owned subsidiary of Consolidated Edison, Inc. (Con Edison) (NYSE: ED), one of the nation’s largest investor-owned energy companies, is a regulated electric and gas utility that serves approximately 226,450 electric customers and 131,460 natural gas customers in New York. For more information about O&R, please visit www.oru.com.

PHOTO: O&R put the finishing touches on its Suffern natural gas main replacement project this month. Reviewing the $1.6-million project recently in the village are, from left: Director of Gas Technical Services Flannan Hehir, General Manager of Gas Operations Glenn Meyers, President and CEO Tim Cawley and Section Manager for Contractor Administration Mike Casale/ O&R