Dive Brief:

• ​The New York Public Service Commission on Thursday approved a plan to build three transmission lines to allow more electricity to reach the New York City area.
• The lines, valued at $511 million, will be built by Consolidated Edison and the New York Power Authority. The goal is to have them in service by the summer of 2016.
• The PSC also approved on Thursday a plan by Con Edison and the NYPA for 100 megawatts of demand response and energy efficiency.  

Dive Insight: 

The Con Edison and NYPA power lines would serve as a hedge against the possible closure of Entergy's 2,037 MW Indian Point nuclear power plant at the end of 2015. Entergy wants to extend the plant's license beyond 2015. But New York Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to shut the plant, which is 50 miles north of Manhattan, for fear of an accident similar to the Fukushima disaster in Japan in 2011.