00:00Joining us now is Valerie Colletti, Senior Vice President of Distribution Operations at ComEd,
00:05here to share how the electric grid is being ready for what may be the most intense heat wave
00:11Chicago has experienced in years. With air conditioners expected to run at full capacity
00:16and heated and accurate temperatures soaring here, ComEd has a key guidance for staying
00:22safe and managing energy use wisely. Valerie, thanks so much for joining us.
00:27Thank you for having me. Good morning. Good morning. How has ComEd prepared its
00:31infrastructure ahead of this prolonged dangerous heat wave? Well, fortunately, our grid is performing
00:37well, as expected, and we're not seeing any significant impacts from the weather. And
00:43trust me, that doesn't happen by accident. We really begin for preparing for weather like this
00:48well in advance. We conduct rigorous load forecasting along with emergency response drills. We want to
00:56make sure we're ready for these high demand scenarios. We also make sure supplies are very important. We
01:03have mobile trailers that we use to respond to outages. We make sure they're stocked. We make
01:09sure we have supply chain readiness, that we have all of our critical inventory. One thing that we also
01:16do to prepare that's really important is proactive inspections and repairs before summer even begins
01:21to make sure all of our equipment is in working order so that when we see things like air conditioning load
01:27increases that our system can respond and we can boost or stabilize that voltage across our feeders.
01:34Lastly, we've also increased our staffing. That's very important as well to make sure we have our field
01:41workforce ready to go, that we're monitoring the system, and that any outages that do occur, we can restore
01:47our customers quickly and safely. So in summary, we're prepared. And what kind of strain does multi-day
01:55stretch of 90 to 100 degree heat and also temperatures at night in the upper 70s and lower 80s
02:02place on the power grid? Well, when we're in this type of extreme heat, we're closely monitoring the
02:10system. We have to make sure all of our equipment is performing efficiently and reliably. And from our
02:16experience in these multi-day extreme heat events, we know to expect increased demand, electricity
02:23demand, really around more use of air conditioning and other cooling systems. So again, we're monitoring
02:29the weather. We make sure we have adequate staffing. And we also implement heat stress prevention plans
02:35to maintain grid reliability, protect our infrastructure, and also our field workforce.
02:42What's your message to customers facing these extreme heat conditions?
02:46Well, first of all, we want our customers to know that we're here for them. Our investments that
02:52we've made in the grid have delivered clearly more reliability and more resiliency. Since really
02:59going back to 2011, our smart grid upgrades have helped avoid over 24.7 million outages and improved
03:08reliability by 57%. And that's a big deal because we recognize that any outage has an impact on our
03:16customers, especially when we're in heat like this. So during the heat, again, we're monitoring the
03:21system around the clock. We're ready to respond to be there for our customers as needed. And we also
03:27know with this increased energy and usage due to the extreme heat, there may be customers that are
03:33concerned about their energy costs. We care about that as well. ComEd has award-winning energy efficiency
03:39programs and financial assistance options. And customers can get that at ComEd.com backslash
03:45bill support. That's important as well. And with Intensi becoming more frequent, how is ComEd
03:52adapting for long-term resilience? Well, we've been investing in our system for the last 10 to 15 years
04:00to make it more reliable, more resilient. We've put in advanced technology like distribution automation.
04:07You may hear those called smart switches, and they really help us reroute power in our trouble areas.
04:15Last summer, distribution automation avoided 986,000 customer interruptions. That's huge. We also
04:23collaborate with Argonne National Lab and the Electrical Power Research Institute. They're known as EPRI,
04:29to do models on mid-century climate scenarios and really identify resilient investments. So that's
04:38important as well. Lastly, some things we do to prepare is adapt our design standards to account
04:43for more frequent, intense weather events like the heat wave that we're experiencing right now.
04:49Valerie Colletti, Senior Vice President of Distribution Operations at ComEd. Thanks again for
04:54joining us. You are full of knowledge, and we appreciate all the information this morning.
04:59Great. Thank you for having us. Stay safe. Thank you.
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