Dive Summary:
- Florida Power & Light Co. (FPL) announced a new three-year, $500 million plan to accelerate the storm hardening of South Florida’s electrical system and implement lessons learned from Sandy.
- FPL, based in Juno Beach, said the plan includes strengthening poles and equipment serving 250 to 370 critical facilities;replacing more than 4,000 wood transmission structures with stronger concrete structures; and upgrading more than 3,600 ceramic post insulators with more resilient polymer material.
- In addition, FPL will install real-time, water-level monitoring systems to help anticipate challenges that could result from flooding at 25 substations.
From the press release:
“The accelerated hardening effort being announced today builds upon the approved program FPL has been executing since 2007. From 2007 through 2012, FPL invested a total of nearly $460 million to strengthen the electricity-delivery backbone and harden infrastructure…"