Five days before Hurricane Sandy made landfall in southern New Jersey and punched a black hole in the power grid from Atlantic City to Long Island Sound's Connecticut shore towns, a high-powered group of utility executives convened a press conference in a well-lit auditorium at Con Ed's headquarters building off East 14 Street in New York City. They were gathered to roll out details of a $75-million smart-grid initiative. The top administrators from eight utilities serving New York state sat on the dais, along with the head of the New York Independent System Operator and the chairman of the state public service commission.
In his opening remarks, Con Ed Chairman Kevin Burke envisioned a stronger, more robust electrical grid with a "greater degree of reliability and sustainability than we have today." He surrendered the podium to Patricia A. Hoffman, assistant secretary for the U.S. Dept. of Energy's Office of Energy Delivery and Energy Reliability. Hoffman highlighted the program and placed it in the context of some $4.5 billion in federal stimulus funding for grid modernization.