Florida, Biden Announces US$600 Million Fund for Electricity”/>
United States President Joe Biden will travel on Sunday (13/10) or today WIB to areas of Florida hit by consecutive hurricanes. According to the White House, Biden will announce federal funding for projects to strengthen the power grid.
Biden will visit St. Petersburg, one of the Florida cities hardest hit by Hurricane Milton last week, announced $612 million for six Department of Energy projects in the southeast. The two projects are focused on Florida and provide a combined US$94 million in federal funding.
Gainesville Regional Utilities will use the funding to help mitigate the increasing impact of extreme weather in north-central Florida, “through storm hardening, as well as faster recovery through the deployment of automated recovery devices and tools that will enable more efficient and precise field team dispatch during the outage,” the White House said in a statement carried by ABC News.
Also read: Hurricane Hits Florida, 17 Killed and 2 Million Families Experience Power Outages
Private utility technology developer Switched Source will work with Florida Power and Light to implement Phase-EQ. This, “Optimizing power flow in distribution circuits, will unlock more than 200 MW of system capacity, and improve reliability on circuits serving communities most vulnerable to prolonged power outages,” according to the White House.
“This investment is part of the president’s commitment to make long-term investments that protect, improve and upgrade our nation’s electric grid, especially in the face of extreme weather events,” the White House said in a statement.
Biden spoke with many state and local officials, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who he described as very cooperative. When asked whether he would meet with DeSantis on Sunday, Biden said, “Yes as long as the governor has time.”
Also read: 14 Florida residents killed by Hurricane Milton
Hurricane Milton made landfall in Florida as a Category 3 hurricane on Wednesday (9/10) evening. The death toll from the storm rose to at least 17 people on Friday (11/10). Meanwhile, around two million electricity customers in the state are still experiencing blackouts.
According to authorities, among the fatalities were five people who died as a result of the tornado that hit St. Louis. Lucie County on the east coast. In that coastal county, “One victim was found at Spanish Lakes Country Club Village, a 55-and-older retirement community,” St. Lucie County spokesman Erick Gill said.
“I can’t confirm that all of the fatalities were from the hardest-hit Spanish Lakes neighborhood,” Gill told NBC News. “I don’t know if all (the fatalities) were from there, but I know there was more than one.”
Also read: Hurricane Milton hits Florida’s Gulf Coast causing fatalities
Nearly 48 hours after Hurricane Milton made landfall in Florida, about two million power customers were still experiencing outages in the state. At the peak of the storm, more than three million electric customers across Florida experienced outages, but restoration efforts are underway and power is slowly being restored.
The hardest hit areas were concentrated along Florida’s west coast, where Hurricane Milton first made landfall. Pinellas, Hillsborough, Manatee and Sarasota counties experienced significant damage.
Florida Power Light reported about 65,000 customers were still without power Friday, although the company had managed to restore electric service to about 1.3 million customers.
Nearly a week after the storm hit, full restoration of power was still a challenge. The power restoration rate in some districts may not reach 95%. As of Thursday, counties expected to reach that percentage recovery level include Brevard, Charlotte, DeSoto, Flagler, Indian River, Manatee, Sarasota, Seminole and Volusia. (Ant/Z-2)
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