Two of New Jersey's largest power utilities expect to spend at least $6.5 billion to protect systems from more severe weather after suffering massive damage last fall in Superstorm Sandy. Public Service Electric & Gas, Newark, has asked state regulators to approve a $3.9-billion infrastructure plan for electric and natural-gas systems and also plans to spend $1.5 billion on transmission in the next 10 years. Jersey Central Power & Light, part of First Energy, Akron, Ohio, has applied for a $2.6-billion block grant for storm hardening. "We must focus on the resiliency of our systems to withstand natural disasters," says Ralph Izzo, CEO of PSE&G's parent firm. The state's entire energy infrastructure must be rethought, he says. Planned upgrades would have reduced the two million outages from Sandy by 800,000 and would have protected Newark Airport and oil refineries from shutdown, Izzo says.
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