Central Maine Power is installing hundreds of devices on its system to restore electricity more quickly following outages.
CMP spokesperson Dustin Wlodkowski said the equipment can isolate problem areas and reroute power to nearby homes and businesses. The units can reduce restoration time from a few hours to just a few minutes, he added.
"Our No. 1 cause of outages at CMP is fallen trees," he said. "So customers may get their power back in a matter of minutes in a situation where in the past they may have had to wait hours."
The units are connected in real time to CMP's operations headquarters, so staff can react quickly to outages, Wlodkowski said.
CMP started putting smart devices on its lines in 2023 and installed 250 units this year. About one fifth of CMP customers are benefitting from the devices according to the utility.
It plans to double the installations to 500 in 2026, according to Wlodkowski.
"We know that our customers have told us that both to their daily lives, their businesses and local economies outages are impacting them in a time-costing way," he said. "So by minimizing the length of these outages were are helping our customers."
The project is part of CMP's aim to strengthen its grid in the face of more powerful and unpredictable weather driven by a warming climate.
This summer the utility said it wanted a significant rate increase to help hire more line workers and install new equipment in an effort to lower storm recovery costs.
