Michigan Utility Companies Rank How Low On Reliability?

While reading an article about Michigan’s Attorney General wanting utility companies to “provide greater credits to assist customers who have lost hundreds of dollars or more in food and alternative housing costs” I came across some interesting information.

MLive informed us of an assessment performed by the Citizens Utility Board of Michigan in 2018.  According to the report:

“The Citizens Utility Board of Michigan (CUB of MI) was formed in 2018 to represent the interests of residential energy customers across the state of Michigan. CUB of MI educates and engages Michigan consumers in support of cost-effective investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy and against unfair rate increase requests.”

In that assessment, we find out that in 2018 Michigan utility companies ranked the 13^th worst in the country when it comes to the average number of minutes of outage per customer over the year with what they call Major Event Days.

Michigan also ranked the 9^th worst in the country in the number of minutes of outage per customer without Major Event Days over the year.

How did Michigan fair when it came to average restoration times in 2018?  Not well at all.  According to the report on page 8:

• The average restoration time per outage with Major Event Days was 319 minutes which ranked us as the 8^th worst in the country.

• The average restoration time per outage without Major Event Days was 175 minutes which ranked us as the 2^nd worst in the country.

Looks like Michigan utility companies have some work to do.  We are told by the reporting that the Citizens Utility Board of Michigan assessment will be addressed by the Commission possibly this fall.

There is quite a bit of great information in that assessment that you will find interesting.