Sept. 17, 5 p.m. Update: Hurricane Restoration

Restoration Moves Ahead at Quicker Pace

Entergy Texas, Inc. is making progress in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike and is now projecting an Oct. 6 restoration of electric service to all customers. Company officials estimate that power will be restored to 80 percent of Beaumont within 15 days, weather permitting. Power was restored in the evening of Sept. 15 for some customers in The Woodlands, north of Houston. The majority of customers in The Woodlands are expected to have power restored by tonight.

All other population centers that Entergy Texas serves are projected to be 80 percent restored by Sept. 25. Many customers throughout Entergy Texas’s service area will have power before the estimated time.

The pace of restoration will steadily increase as Entergy Texas completes assessments and continues repairing damage to the transmission and distribution systems.

Restoration estimates are based on the numbers of customers who can take power. Tens of thousands of customers in Texas will likely have their electricity service returned every day during the restoration process. Progress will be slowest in areas that are the most severely damaged or that are physically remote.

“Let me emphasize that our crews are committed to getting all power restored as safely and as quickly as possible,” said Joe Domino, president and chief executive officer for Entergy Texas. “Even so, we are not in a race. We still have a lot of work in front of us that will take weeks to complete.

Animated maps that show the progress in restoring service in Texas and estimated dates when power will be returned to Texas communities are posted on Entergy’s Web site www.entergy.com 

Restoration Strategy

To manage restoration on multiple fronts, Entergy applies its proven restoration process. The first priority is to work with generation and transmission to restore critical paths to reestablish the transmission grid. Next comes reestablishing critical customer loads such as safety and energy infrastructure with input from city and county officials. Reconnecting groups of customers by large numbers and easiest to restore comes next.

During this multi-front restoration, the length of time customers have been without power from Gustav has been factored into how Entergy locates its workers.

Entergy applies innovative ways to expedite restoration. One example is the use of helicopters to lift trees off of transmission lines. This is much faster than having crews in trucks travel along rights of way to remove trees by cutting them apart.

Generation, Transmission and Distribution

The expected return to service of both units at Entergy’s Lewis Creek plant near Willis, Texas, today combined with transmission repairs, will allow Entergy in its area north of Houston to serve 10 times more customer load than is currently possible and avoid potential rolling blackouts. Lewis Creek Unit 1 is online and available for additional load. Unit 2 will be online later today.

Current transmission outages caused by Ike include 143 of 237 transmission lines and 188 of 378 substations out of service across the service territory.

Distribution system damage caused by Hurricane Ike to Entergy’s system includes 6,426 poles and 2,664 transformers damaged or destroyed.

Texas Substations Status

As of midday today, information on restored substations is listed below:

Beaumont network: 11 out of 39 substations are energized.

Huntsville network:  2 out of 16 substations are energized.

Conroe network: 1 out of 12 substations are energized.

New Caney network: 1 out of 17 substations are energized.

Orange network: 11 out of 15 substations are energized.

Silsbee network:  6 out of 18 substations are energized.

Woodlands network: 3 out of 4 substations are energized.

Gustav’s Impact

Damages caused by Gustav included 241 transmission lines and 354 substations knocked out of service, and in distribution, 10,476 poles and 4,349 transformers damaged or destroyed.

Restoration Workforce

Entergy’s workforce size remains at 12,800, with 7,900 of those resources restoring service in Texas. Changes in the workforce will occur as workers from Arkansas and Louisiana are redeployed to Texas as restoration is completed in those areas.