RICHMOND, Va. - Dominion Virginia Power entered the final
phase of its Hurricane Isabel restoration effort Wednesday by blanketing those
areas without power with repair crews.
The number of customers without power fell to less than 9,000
Wednesday afternoon. Since the storm blasted the most populated sections of
Virginia on Sept. 18, the company has restored power to more than 99 percent
of the 1.8 million customers affected systemwide. The company expects to achieve
its goal of restoring power to all customers by Friday.
The Gloucester, Northern Neck and the Newport News/Hampton
areas felt the full wrath of Isabel and were among the hardest hit areas in
the state. Dominion has concentrated its efforts on those areas, dispatching
more than 2,300 field personnel to get the lights back on. Those areas account
for about 7,000 of the remaining 10,000 customers without power.
"We are in the homestretch of our largest restoration
ever," said Jimmy D. Staton, senior vice president-Operations. "We
expect to have virtually all of the Richmond area fully restored by tonight
and are on track to have all customers back on by Friday."
As the number of outages decrease, those still without power
should call Dominion's Customer Service to make sure their outage has been reported.
The toll-free number is 1-888-667-3000.
Some of the out-of-state crews that helped restore power returned
to their utilities Wednesday. The total workforce now stands at about 8,000.
"We are very grateful for those crews, who have been
away from their homes and families for nearly two weeks. They have done an extraordinary
job. Outages now are centered in smaller geographic areas, and we have plenty
of people working the remaining jobs," said Staton.
The destruction to electrical facilities caused by Isabel
and Dominion's massive restoration effort is expected to run into the tens of
millions of dollars. The final cost is not known yet and may not be known for
some time; Dominion has been focused solely on restoring service. Regardless
of the cost to Dominion, electric rates are capped in Virginia through July
1, 2007.
As cleanup continues, Dominion continues to ask its customers
to work safely around downed power lines, especially those that are intertwined
with fallen trees. Dominion is beginning to remove electric line material from
customers' roads and yards as well as work with cities and counties as they
remove the debris from Hurricane Isabel.
Dominion is one of the nation's largest producers of energy,
with a diversified and integrated energy portfolio that includes 24,000 megawatts
of generation and 6.3 trillion cubic feet equivalent of proved natural gas reserves.
Dominion also serves 5 million retail energy customers in nine states.
