The upgrades are anticipated to be completed in November 2024, as part of JCP&L's New Jersey Reliability Improvement Project, an element of the company's rate review settlement approved by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities in February.
The upgrades include:
· Replace existing infrastructure with stronger wires and poles to safely carry more electricity and provide more resiliency in storms.
· Upgrading fuses and installing additional remote-access devices and reclosers, which allow power to be rerouted to adjacent lines when an outage occurs, minimizing the number of impacted customers.
· Installing TripSaver devices, which sense temporary abnormalities along power lines, such as a tree branch bouncing off lines, and automatically re-energize the line after the condition has passed without having to send a crew to investigate.
· Additional tree trimming and vegetation management along the circuits.
Equipment enhancements will be carried out through more than 10 miles of lines in Monmouth County and approximately 10 miles of lines in Morris County.
The Monmouth County upgrades will start at a JCP&L substation in Howell Township and continue along a line running to Freehold Township, serving 2,200 customers. In Morris County, 2,174 customers will benefit from the upgrades, which initiate at a JCP&L substation in Gillette/Long Hill Township before continuing into Chatham Township.
The two lines represent the first of 18 to receive upgrades under the New Jersey Reliability Improvement Project, a two-phase effort to enhance reliability for customers on high-priority lines selected based on historical outage data.
While the first phase, which includes about $95 million in upgrades, is set to be completed over the next three years, second-phase repairs, which are longer-duration projects, are expected to be completed by the end of 2028.
