Hydro One provides up-date to communities and customers affected by flooding across Ontario

TORONTO, May 3, 2019 /CNW/ - Hydro One continues to work with regional authorities in areas affected by flooding to help ensure the safety of customers, emergency responders and its employees. As water levels slowly begin to drop and customers return to their homes, Hydro One wants to let customers know that they are on the ground and ready to begin the process of reconnecting electricity.

A Hydro One employee tests a local transformer in Constance Bay, located outside of Ottawa. (CNW Group/Hydro One Inc.)

In order to have electricity safely reconnected, customers in flood affected areas should hire a licensed electrical contractor to assess and repair any water damage to your home's electrical systems. The licensed electrical contractor will then file a permit with the Electrical Safety Authority (ESA) who will determine if it is safe to restore power. The ESA will contact Hydro One directly and provide the approval to reconnect a customer. Customers do not need to contact Hydro One directly for this step.

A list of licensed electrical contractors can be found at https://findacontractor.esasafe.com/.  Homeowners should ask their contractor for a copy of the ESA Certificate of Inspection for record keeping and insurance.

To help ensure the safety of customers, emergency responders and our crews, customers who were disconnected because flooding affected ground level transformers will also need an ESA inspection. The ESA and Hydro One will be visiting these areas together and reconnecting customers where it is safe.

Hydro One is waiving all connection fees along with delivery fees for the disconnection period to help customers during this time and continues to urge customers in areas where there is still a risk of flooding to call 1-800-434-1235 if water starts to reach their electrical outlets, baseboard heaters or furnace. A crew will be immediately dispatched to safely disconnect power to their home. In addition, Hydro One continues to cancel planned outages in regions where customers are affected by flooding.

For more information about how we restore power and additional safety tips visit www.hydroone.com/power-outages-and-safety/flood-safety.    

About Hydro One:
We are Ontario's largest electricity transmission and distribution provider with almost 1.4 million valued customers, over C$25.7 billion in assets and 2018 annual revenues of over C$6.2 billion. Our team of approximately 8,600 skilled and dedicated employees proudly build and maintain a safe and reliable electricity system which is essential to supporting strong and successful communities. In 2018, Hydro One invested almost $1.6 billion in its 30,000 circuit km of high-voltage transmission and 123,000 circuit km of primary distribution networks and injected approximately $1.3 billion into the economy by buying goods and services in Ontario. We are committed to the communities where we live and work through community investment, sustainability and diversity initiatives. We are one of only six utility companies in Canada to achieve the Sustainable Electricity Company designation from the Canadian Electricity Association. Through Hydro One Telecom Inc.'s extensive fibre optic network, we also provide advanced broadband telecommunications services on a wholesale basis. Hydro One Limited's common shares are listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: H).

 

SOURCE Hydro One Inc.

For further information: Hydro One Media Relations 24 hours a day at 1-877-506-7584 (toll-free in Ontario only) or 416-345-6868. Our website is www.HydroOne.com. Follow us on facebook.com/hydrooneofficial, twitter.com/hydroone and instagram.com/hydrooneofficial.