Orange and Rockland To Invest $7.3M in Smart Grid Pilot

Utilities in the Orange and Rockland (O&R) are are to invest $7.3 US million over the next three years in a smart grid pilot.  This encompasses about 14 circuit areas within Rockland communities which stretch from Suffern to Nyack.  The circuits within these areas are to receive new smart grid communication switches and other “intelligent” devices that will improve the overall reliability of Rockland electric grid.

The pilot will include about 25,000 customers which include communities such as: Spring Valley, Suffern, Chestnut Ridge, Monsey, New Square, Kaser, New Hempstead, Nanuet, Tallman, Montello, New City, West Nyack, Nyack and Bardonia.

According to O&R the project further benefits its New York customers because it allows O&R to defer a major capital investment of $45M for a new substation and a substantial underground transmission line extension that would have otherwise been needed to serve this area.

The project is funded by a mixture of research grants and federal and state grants to pilot a new era in the way O&R maintains and operates its electric delivery system.

This operation featured nine separate projects that include: building a communications and information platform that would power, inform and control the Smart Grid Functions, rebuilding sections of both substations to make them compatible with Smart Grid technology and upgrading the electric distribution system enable it to accept Smart Grid technology.