Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
Progress Energy Florida has alerted the Florida Public Service Commission that its restoration costs for Hurricane Charley "will almost certainly exceed ... by a substantial amount" the nearly $41-million the utility has set aside for emergencies.
In a filing Friday with the PSC, the St. Petersburg utility also warned that it expects its restoration expenses for Frances to exceed those for Charley.
Investor-owned utilities such as Progress can accumulate storm reserve funds through their monthly rates to help pay for restoring electricity after major storms. Progress has about $40.9-million in its reserve fund. If recovery costs exceed what has been collected in the fund, the utility has the option of asking the PSC for permission to add a surcharge to customer bills to make up for the shortfall.
Progress spokesman Keith Poston said it was too early to tell what steps the company will take to cover the expected deficit in its reserve fund, noting that it hasn't yet calculated its final restoration costs for Charley and Frances and that it could face additional expenses related to Ivan.
In its PSC filing, Progress said Charley knocked out power to about 502,000 customers in eight of the 34 Florida counties it serves, while Frances caused 832,898 outages throughout the utility's entire Florida service territory.
Charley damaged 83 Progress substations, 628 transmission structures and roughly 700 miles of transmission lines, while Frances damaged 105 substations and 1,131 miles of distribution and transmission lines, Progress said.
Florida Power & Light of Juno Beach said in a similar filing with the PSC last Thursday that it expects Charley to deplete roughly half of its $345-million storm reserve fund, and that the added costs from Frances will "very likely" leave the reserve fund in deficit.
Utility restoration bills could rise higher in the wake of Hurricane Ivan. Although Ivan appears likely to veer west of the Tampa Bay area, local utilities believe the outer reaches of the storm still could trigger some local power outages. Progress and Tampa Electric, which finished restoring power to their bay area customers over the weekend, said Monday that they have retained some out-of-state line crews to assist in Ivan-related restoration efforts, if needed.
"Ivan's a big storm," Tampa Electric spokesman Ross Bannister said. "Some of those outside bands of wind and rain could knock out some customers."
Progress' Poston said that while the utility's bay area customers are "likely to be spared significant impact" from Ivan, "we've all learned over the last month that these storms are notoriously difficult to predict."
- Louis Hau can be reached at 813 226-3404 or hau@sptimes.com