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Is National Grid brand following BP in American market?

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By The Drum Team, Editorial

February 16, 2011 | 4 min read

In the wake of BP another British energy company is coming under fire in the US. National Grid has been forced on to the PR defensive following a number of mishaps in New England.

Fast forward to this grim and grisly winter. A storm on Boxing Day knocked out power to 120,000 National Grid customers in Massachusetts for long periods.

The state’s attorney general, Martha Coakley, who represents the local consumers, asked for an investigation. “It took National Grid up to 20 hours to respond to calls about downed wires, leaving firefighters to guard those wires and unable to respond to other emergencies, including burning and flooding homes,” said Coakley.

She said the utility did not follow an emergency plan to coordinate with local officials before the December storm. She wanted answers as to why National Grid’s restoration effort “was not handled more efficiently.”

In one town Brockton, a house fire had to be tackled by firefighters from nearby towns because their own firefighters were looking after National Grid’s downed wires.

Then in January, with winter weather still gripping the state, the London-based firm, which employs 5000 locally, announced it would cut roughly seven percent of its US workforce, or 1,200 employees, to save $200 million.

The timing could have been better. Last week, during the first of three public hearings on the British firm’s storm response, Coakley said she was worried that National Grid’s cost-cutting plan “ will have an effect on the company’s ability to handle storm events and other critical operations.’’

The layoffs would not hurt its ability to respond to emergencies, the firm insisted.

The company had no fewer than 24 people at the Gloucester inquiry into its storm response. It says it sent out more than 600 crews. Within 36 hours of the storm’s end, it had restored power to tens of thousands of customers.

The utility says it had been on guard for an epic storm but admitted it was overwhelmed in some areas by downed wires: 3,000 on the South Shore alone, compared to 700 in the rest of the state.

“One of the key goals of our new business model is to sharpen our focus on the local areas we serve and to improve service for customers, including restoring power during storms as quickly and safely as possible.”

Ms Coakley first came to British attention in 1997, when she prosecuted British nanny Louise Woodward over the death of a baby she was looking after. Last year Ms Coakley ran for Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat but was defeated by Scott Brown.

The attorney general has taken issue with National Grid before. State regulators approved only half a $100 million natural gas increase after she raised questions about “inappropriate expenses’’ that National Grid billed to customers - such as shipping an executive’s wine collection from Britain to the United States.

As a Brit, I have grudging sympathy with National Grid, just as I did with BP - whose efforts after the cock- ups that caused the disaster were indeed Herculean. National Grid put a ton of effort in after that storm. If only they has been more assiduous in pre-planning with our American cousins. And if only they had delayed that job cuts announcement!

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