PURA: Eversource was unprepared for its 800,000 outages

Mark Paznoikas Keith Phaneuf The chair of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority says that Eversource Energy badly underestimated the threat of Tropical Storm Isaias by preparing for between 125,000 and 380,000 outages, while more than 800,000  of its customers lost power at the peak and nearly 600,000 still were in the dark Wednesday night. PURA is opening an investigation of Eversource and the state’s other power company, United Illuminating, at the request of Gov. Ned Lamont, said Marissa P. Gillett, the chair of the regulatory authority. Gillett spoke to reporters outside Eversource offices in Berlin after Lamont, Gillett and others met with the utility’s top leaders. Overall, peak outages in Connecticut exceeded one million, Gillett said. Gillett said preparation plans filed by UI and Eversource showed that UI accurately projected the the storm’s threat, while Eversource, which serves customers in 149 of the state’s 169 cities and towns, did not. Lamont said he was not happy with Eversource’s preparation or sense of “urgency” about restoring services, though he said his immediate focus was on seeing most customers get power back by the end of the week. Katie Dykes, the commissioner of energy and environmental protection, said the administration wants PURA to examine what Eversource has done with ratepayer money to harden its infrastructure, hire sufficient staff and pre-stage extra crews in advance of the storm. “This is their job. This is what they do. They are a reliability infrastructure company. And what we pay them to do in our rates is to be prepared for an event like this — and especially when you are in the middle of a pandemic,” said Dykes, who was chair of PURA for three years before becoming Lamont’s commissioner of energy and environmental protection in 2019. Craig Hallstrom, the president of regional electric operations for Eversource, appeared with Lamont, but he left before Gillett and Dykes made their comments to a smaller group of reporters after the formal news conference ended.  Jim Judge, the chairman, president and chief executive, participated in the private briefing but did not meet with reporters. Documents provided by PURA show that UI informed regulators it was declaring the coming storm a “level 3 event,” which anticipates that 30% to 50% of UI customers would be affected, with outages that could last five days or more. Eversource prepared for a milder  “level 4 event,” which anticipates 10% to 29% of customers affected, with outages lasting two to six days.Later, Eversource issued a statement defending and explaining its preparations: “As a storm approaches, we engage a variety of different resources – including UConn’s predictive model and experts from outside weather services – to track the storm and forecast its severity and path. Based on the tools and guidance we received from our external experts, we followed our plan and filed for the appropriate level of classification. From the time we declared our initial level based on our best available tracking models at the end of last week, the storm’s path deviated from those models and we’ve reclassified the storm accordingly as our models dictated, which is a typical utility practice once a storm hits.” Hallstrom said 450 line crews and 235 tree crews were at work, a number that would double in the next 24 hours as out-of-state crews arrive. About 250 of the 450 line crews were Eversource employees based in Connecticut, while the others were contractors who regularly work for the utility. “We fully understand the magnitude of this event,” he said. The utility said Wednesday night that power had been restored to more than 215,000 customers. About 46% of its customers were without power, compared to 25% of UI’s . UI serves 17 communities, including Bridgeport and New Haven. An initial assessment by Eversource found damage at 14,475  locations, including 214 broken poles, 90 damaged transformers, and 1,400 spans of downed wire. Nearly 1,000 trees will have to be cleared. The PURA investigation comes nearly a decade after legislators and regulators examined the the capabilities and response of the two utilities to two storms in 2011, Tropical Storm Irene in August and a freak snowstorm on Oct. 29. The chief operating officer of Connecticut Light & Power, which later became part of Eversource, resigned that November. “Several years ago, Connecticut experienced largescale outages that took days to recover from, and we were told that the utilities were improving their resources so that they can be prepared for the next time Mother Nature inevitably hits again,” Lamont said in a statement issued by his office. “And now here we are, with a wholly inadequate response to another storm. I’m asking PURA to begin this investigation so that we can determine whether the companies are meeting their legal obligations and whether any penalties need to be applied. The people of Connecticut deserve better than the service they are receiving.”Lamont, whose standing has soared during the COVID-19 pandemic, pivoted Wednesday to the prospect of a prolonged blackout in the heat and humidity of mid-summer. Tropical Storm Isaias’ brief but violent sprint through Connecticut on Tuesday left residential and business customers without power, making Lamont the proxy for consumers eager to know when they can expect light and air conditioning. Hallstrom offered no explanation of why a storm that arrived in Connecticut with less than hurricane winds was so destructive. He said the damage assessment was continuing, but he expected the storm to rank as the second-worst for outages, more than the 500,000 the company experienced in Super Storm Sandy. Earlier, outside the town hall in Wethersfield during a tour of storm damage in central Connecticut, the governor waved off questions about the preparedness of the two public utilities for a wind storm that caused what Lamont said then was  likely to be the state’s third-largest power outage. Ultimately, he said later, it may rank higher. “Rather than do a debrief on what went wrong, we’re going to make sure we make things right for next three or four days — then we’ll have plenty of time for what ifs,” Lamont said. But Sen. Norm Needleman, D-Essex, who co-chairs of the Energy and Technology Committee, pressed Eversource for more details about the personnel assigned to restoring power to Connecticut. In a plan published in February by PURA, Eversource listed 719 “restoration line resources,” including 5 directors, 127 managers and supervisors, 362 overhead line workers and 225 “other craft workers.” It seems illogical, Needleman said, that Tropical Storm Isaias, despite winds that exceeded 60 mph at times, could have caused so many outages in just five hours. “How did that lead to one of the worst outages in the history of Connecticut?” Needleman said.

Residents raise concerns as Old Lyme sidewalk project moves forward

Mary Biekert Old Lyme — Town officials are inching ever nearer to solidifying plans for additional sidewalk improvements in the Sound View neighborhood that they say will improve pedestrian safety on Hartford Avenue and Shore Road, as well as further help connect the community to its beach areas.After being awarded a state grant to help pay for those improvements in late 2018, the town, through what’s known as the Community Connectivity Grant Committee, has been working toward planning and designing those sidewalk improvements since early 2019 with BSC Group engineers of Glastonbury. Plans currently include placing 5-feet-wide sidewalk on the western portion of Hartford Avenue from Bocce Lane to Route 156 within the town’s right of way, as well as including a 2.5-foot “utility strip” between the sidewalk and the road to allow for signage and mailbox placement. The town also has included sidewalk plans spanning Route 156 from the Old Lyme Police Station to Cross Lane. The plans are presently being reviewed by the Department of Transportation, which awarded the $400,000 Community Connectivity Grant, for feedback and possible final approval. The $400,000 grant is earmarked to cover only construction costs associated with the project, while the town is responsible for paying for its engineering and design work. The town approved $30,000 as part of its 2019-2020 budget, and later appropriated an additional $10,000, to cover the costs. The town was awarded the grant shortly after it had completed a similar sidewalk project on the southern Hartford Avenue earlier in 2018. That project included landscaping, handicapped-accessible sidewalks, improved drainage, bike racks and a bikeway, among other upgrades. Installing sidewalks now on the upper, unfinished half of Hartford Avenue, selectwoman and Committee Chairwoman Mary Jo Nosal said, will complete the larger vision the town has had in mind for sidewalks along the entire roadway, providing pedestrians with safe access to the beach and bringing more foot traffic to businesses on Hartford Avenue and Route 156. “The project is a safety project," she said. "We have pedestrians walking in the middle of Hartford Avenue during the summer and it’s really not safe. So we are trying to make it more pedestrian friendly and safe.” “There is an economic development piece to this, as well,” Nosal continued, describing a larger vision of connecting the greater community to the beach area. Nosal said the committee soon will finalize the plans before putting together a bid package. She believes the town solicit bids on the project in late fall, with construction set to begin in spring. Bid prices will determine whether the entirety of the project can be completed at once. BSC Group engineer Kurt Prochorena, who has been designing and engineering the sidewalks with the committee, said at the committee’s last meeting in July that the town may be able to complete the full project within its allotted $400,000. Nosal said the committee will need to decide which part of the project will be eliminated, should the need arise. She said the sidewalk portion on the upper half of Hartford Avenue will be completed no matter what, while a portion of the Shore Road sidewalk may need to be removed for the project to fall within budget. If bids come in above budget, Nosal said the town may need to seek an additional grant from the state to later finish the project. Before going out to bid, however, Nosal said the town will host individual information sessions with the more than a dozen Hartford Avenue residents whose properties will directly abut the proposed sidewalk. The committee sent out notices to the homeowners last week to schedule individual meetings with each on Aug. 15 and 22, she said. Homeowners will meet with Prochorena and committee members to voice concerns and be presented sidewalk plans and how the walkways will look in front of their homes. Concerns raised Homeowners recently have raised concerns about the project. Presently homeowners on the northern part of Hartford Avenue maintain the town’s right of way, or what now simply appear to be grassy strips of land that directly abut yards, as if it were part of them. Despite understanding this strip of land is not their property and that the town can use the right of way to install sidewalks, homeowners who recently spoke with The Day said they worry new sidewalks will allow people to walk in close proximity — in same cases mere feet — to the front exterior of their homes, as well as increase flooding issues that already exist on portions of the road and which affect homeowners’ yards and driveways. In a petition sent to the town last month and which was drafted by Hartford Avenue homeowners Tom and Betsy Portelance, more than a dozen homeowners asked the town to reconsider reducing the proposed width of the sidewalks, arguing 5 feet is too wide and will place sidewalk almost directly underneath front windows and doors. "This will put a walk-way practically on our front porches or doorsteps and will eliminate any parking on the grassy strip that now exists," the petition says. Committee members, who were aware of these concerns, said at their last meeting they did not believe the 5-foot width could be reduced, as it is the town and state Department of Transportation’s standard sidewalk width and adequately allows for passing space and Americans with Disabilities Act accessibility, Prochorena had said. He was not immediately available for comment this week. Nosal said by phone this week the committee has listened to residents' concerns and said the sidewalks will, in fact, improve present flooding issues on the road, directing rainwater toward the road to be caught by catch-basins, rather than properties. She also said the project will improve driveway entrances and level out the right-of-way portion of the road as parts of it are currently uneven. Committee member and Sound View Commission Chairman Frank Pappalardo said by phone Wednesday, “There are valid concerns, we certainly want to hear them and if there is something we can do to help. I think it’s a matter of people being unaware of the details and once the engineer goes over the details, we hope it will help a lot.” Pappalardo said the committee has been making efforts, both by mailing notifications over the last year and posting letters in the neighborhood newsletter, to inform residents of the upcoming changes. The project “will certainly help with pedestrian safety without doubt. A lot of people walk in the street on Hartford Avenue and a lot of people walk on Route 156, to get to the business(es) and that’s even more dangerous,” Pappalardo said. Sidewalks make it "much safer for pedestrians and it will tie the business in with a little easier access.” First Selectman Tim Griswold, who was present at the committee’s July 24 meeting and who asked if it were possible to make exceptions to the sidewalk width standard, said by phone Wednesday, “I guess we will go through these meetings and hopefully a number will show up and maybe there will be a number of minds changed" about the sidewalk width. Griswold said DOT will have ultimate jurisdiction over the sidewalk’s width and was not clear under which circumstances the agency would allow changes to its standards.

America's jobs crisis could be about to get even worse

Anneken Tappe, CNN Business America's fragile jobs market recovery, after just two months of improvement, appears to be losing steam as Covid-19 infections rise and federal funds for businesses begin to dry up. On Friday, the US government is set to release its monthly jobs report, and economists are predicting another 1.6 million jobs were added in July — a sharp slowdown from the 4.8 million added in June. That would bring the monthly unemployment rate to 10.5% in July, from 11.1% in June. If those predictions hold true, America would still be down some 13 million jobs since February, and the unemployment rate would still be higher than at the peak of the 2007-09 financial crisis. Although most economists say the pace of the recovery slowed in July, some say it reversed. Oxford Economics senior US economist Lydia Boussour says she expects Friday's report to show a loss of 280,000 jobs, rather than a gain. That would signal even more clearly that the foundation of the recovery is cracking. Wednesday's ADP employment report, which is the private-sector equivalent of the jobs report and based on a different survey, disappointed expectations -- dramatically. The report showed only 167,000 jobs added in July, compared with 1.5 million expected. Another government jobs survey, from the Census Bureau, indicated a decline in jobs last month. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump boasted America would see "another big job number on Friday," during an interview on Fox Wednesday morning. Trump said he had not yet seen the jobs number, for which he gets a preview. "July is so uncertain because some areas, some sectors continued to reopen in the early part of the month, and then things started to change," said Jeanette Garretty, chief economist at Robertson Stephens Wealth Management. This was exacerbated by federal money for businesses through the paycheck protection program running out, she added. Democrats and Republicans in Congress are still struggling to forge another stimulus package. It has been more than three months since the pandemic decimated America's labor market, bringing about the worst job loss on record and the highest unemployment rate since the Great Depression. The situation has improved since then, but we're a long way from back to normal. Not all sectors are recovering at the same pace. There might be more layoffs in the hospitality industry as some states pause their reopening plans, but other areas of the economy, such as manufacturing and construction, may have added jobs. Lawmakers are billions of dollars apart No matter where Friday's numbers come in, the pressure is on lawmakers in Washington to respond. Politicians will jump on the report to show either the improvements in the jobs market or how many people remain out of work. Congress is still trying to agree on terms for the next round of stimulus measures. Last week, Democrats and Republicans were literally billions apart in their proposals. A key point of contention is the $600 weekly federal booster to regular unemployment benefits, which expired last week. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said earlier this week "if the unemployment goes down, then that number can go down." Many Republicans argue that the $600 benefit keeps people from returning to work, while Democrats say that workers are staying home because it's not yet safe to return to work or because they have to focus on child care. "There are still far fewer opportunities for people looking for work than before," Nick Bunker, director of research at Indeed's Hiring Lab, told CNN Business. Job postings are still about 18% below where they were at the same time last year, even though the trend has improved since the spring, Bunker said. Economists believe that may people who have lost their jobs will return to work as the economy recovers, but a lot of positions won't come back for a very long time, if at all.