LIPA's Newbridge Road substation in Levittown in July 2013.

LIPA's Newbridge Road substation in Levittown in July 2013. Credit: Newsday/John Paraskevas

Two major power cables to Long Island are again experiencing problems as LIPA and PSEG Long Island prepare for the peak summer season.

The utility said that despite the problems, it expects to have excess capacity this summer to handle the load. 

Separately on Wednesday, the Long Island Power Authority said its chief financial officer, Tamela Monroe, will step down, and a search for a new CFO is underway. Monroe, one of four top LIPA officials who maintain homes off Long Island, is LIPA's top-paid official with $332,250 in annual compensation. 

In a presentation at its board of trustees meeting Wednesday, LIPA reported that the Long Island Sound Cable, also known as Y49, is out of service because of a failure in Westchester County, where the cable enters Con Edison’s service territory. The cable, owned and operated by the New York Power Authority, is tentatively scheduled to be back in service by May 25, LIPA said. It has experienced failures over the past several years and is due for an overhaul in the coming year. 

The Neptune cable under the Atlantic Ocean is also operating at reduced capacity because of a transformer failure at LIPA’s Newbridge substation. The cable 660-megawatt cable had been at reduced capacity for much of 2021 because of transformer problems. The line isn’t expected to be back to full capacity until Aug. 1, LIPA said.

Separately, a major transmission line from the Northport power station also failed, reducing power transfer capability by 287 megawatts. It’s expected to be returned to service by mid-June. A megawatt powers from 800 to 1,000 homes. 

LIPA said it’s keeping large and small power plants that had been scheduled for retirement in service, some on an emergency basis, to help handle the summer load, which greatly expands during air-conditioning season.

Smaller peak-power units at West Babylon and Glenwood Landing will continue to be available, LIPA said, and a contract with the NYPA’s Flynn Power Plant, which also had been eyed for retirement, has been extended for five years, with availability this summer.

Despite placing two 5-megawatt storage batteries at Montauk and East Hampton in the last several years, LIPA is still keeping emergency generators at the Montauk substation, while a “mobile-bank” generation is in place in Amagansett “to support the South Fork,” LIPA said in a report. There’s also a mobile bank in Rockaway Beach.

LIPA’s weather forecast for 2022 predicts a peak load of around 5,250 megawatts, but that could grow to 5,666 megawatts if there’s extreme weather, LIPA’s report says. By comparison, LIPA in July 2011 saw a record peak of 5,915 megawatts, and a near-term high of 5,462 megawatts in July 2020.

Even in extreme weather this summer, LIPA said, it expects to have excess capacity of around 975 megawatts.

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