"It's clear that utilities must be ready to address more frequent and powerful storms," said Howard. That utility is regulated by the Long Island Power Authority Board of Trustees. The commission also called out PSEG Long Island, managed by Public Service Enterprise Group, for widespread outages in Isaias. "Including major storms, 2020 had the worst performance for frequency, duration, and customer hours of interruption over the past five years," the PSC said in a statement. Including storms - like Tropical Storm Isaias last August, that left nearly 1.5 million in the state without power - tells a different tale. Shareholders, not customers, will pay for the revenue adjustments, which will not impact utilities' ability to make system improvements.ĭespite the missed targets, the PSC said that outside of major storms, New York's reliability metrics improved slightly in 2020. That outage was caused by a problem on Con Edison's transmission system, a spokesperson said, and the utility continues to invest in its energy-delivery systems "to make them more reliable and resilient." NYSEG will see a negative revenue adjustment of $7 million, also for exceeding its outage frequency target excluding major storms.Ĭon Edison, in a statement, said its service "remains industry leading in reliability," but that its 2020 standing on one metric "was greatly affected by a single event, which was a 33-minute outage in parts of northern Manhattan early on the morning of Aug. The PSC hit Con Edison with a negative revenue adjustment of $5 million for exceeding its network outage frequency target, which excludes outages related to major storms. “While most utilities are doing a good job providing safe and reliable service, four utilities have fallen short of our expectations in certain areas and we will continue to act aggressively to ensure utilities improve performance," Howard said in a statement. Regulators have also handed down revenue cuts for utilities failing to meet certain performance metrics and meter-reading targets. Revenues cut for performance, meter reading failures National Grid said the alleged misconduct is "unacceptable, we have zero tolerance for it." One contractor secured more than $50 million in facility maintenance contracts as a result of the scheme, according to Cuomo's statement. "We are conducting a thorough internal investigation and will be working with our regulator, the NYS Public Service Commission, to enhance our existing controls and to implement additional controls and recommendations where appropriate to help prevent a similar situation in the future," National Grid said in a statement.Īccording to Newsday reporting on the unsealed complaint, the bribes allegedly took place from 2013 to 2020. "As a result of this alleged criminal activity by employees of a regulated utility, the department has launched an immediate investigation into this matter to determine if the utility's customers were financially harmed by this scheme and, if so, to seek full restitution on behalf of the customers," DPS CEO and PSC Chairman John Howard said in a statement.Ī spokesperson for National Grid said the utility is aware of the investigation and has been fully cooperating. There is likely no risk to public safety resulting from the bribes, but DPS officials say they will work to confirm that none of the National Grid contracts in question involved critical gas infrastructure. Alleged bribery scheme focused on maintenance contracts In total, the failures will reduce utility revenues more than $15 million. The state's Public Service Commission (PSC) on Thursday announced it was reducing the revenues of Consolidated Edison (Con Edison), Rochester Gas & Electric (RG&E) and New York State Electric & Gas ( NYSEG) for failure to meet certain service and meter-reading metrics.
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