Consolidated Edison Company of New York Inc. outlined a strategy to continue procurement of demand reduction beyond the 41 megawatts initially planned for 2019 through 2021 under its Brooklyn/Queens Demand Management, or BQDM, program, according to a Jan. 29 filing with the New York Public Service Commission. The company said the strategy, which details the program’s budget and implementation plan beyond 2019, will focus on procuring additional load reductions through customer-side initiatives. The program aims to identify, evaluate, and deploy a portfolio of customer side and non-traditional utility-side solutions to defer traditional infrastructure.

• The company achieved customer side load reduction of over 33.5 MW by summer 2018 and forecasts reductions to exceed the 41 MW cumulative level by 2021.
• Con Edison anticipates that it can procure about 11 MWs of additional customer-side load reductions, prioritizing projects that can be implemented in a timely manner by the summers of 2019 through 2021.
• Utility side solutions implemented in 2017 and 2018 will continue to provide approximately 18 MW, more than the originally anticipated 11 MW in load relief.
• The commission authorized the BQDM program in December 2014 to address overload of sub-transmission feeders serving Brownsville 1 and 2 substations, a significant step for the utility to pursue non-traditional infrastructure investments to meet local demand.
• Through solar, batteries, and energy efficiency, the BQDM program enabled Con Edison to defer the construction of a $1 billion electrical substation in Brooklyn.
• In July 2017, the commission approved Con Edison to continue the program beyond the original three-year scope previously authorized, without additional funding.