NJ Regulator Orders Probe Into Utilities' Response To July 4th Power Outages

By Nikita Biryukov, New Jersey Monitor

July 15, 2026

The state’s energy regulators will examine utilities’ handling of recent outages that left thousands of New Jerseyans without power amid heat waves that pushed temperatures above 100 degrees in parts of the state, sometimes for days.

Regulatory staff will examine utilities’ preparedness before and after the early-July storms that prompted the outages, their communication with customers, and their ability to quickly restore power, Board of Public Utilities President Ben Hertz-Shargel said at the agency’s Wednesday meeting.

“We expect utilities to be prepared, communicate effectively, and restore service safely and as quickly as possible. When they fall short, the board will hold them accountable,” Hertz-Shargel said.

The Garden State saw severe and sudden thunderstorms during the Fourth of July weekend that the New Jersey Utilities Association, a trade group, said knocked out power for roughly 850,000 customers, mostly in areas serviced by PSE&G and Jersey Central Power & Light.

Restoration work was largely complete by July 10, when fewer than 1,000 remained without power, the association said, but by then some lawmakers had already started to raise alarms about days-long outages during sweltering heat.

Assemblyman Gregory McGuckin (Photo by Dana DiFilippo/New Jersey Monitor)

At the time, Assemblyman Greg McGuckin (R-Ocean), whose legislative district falls within JCP&L’s central service area, said regular, extended summer outages had become the utility’s business model. On Wednesday, he said a review was long overdue.

“It’s unacceptable that every summer we continue to end up like a third-world country every time there’s a storm,” McGuckin said. “It’s inexcusable to me that power stations are not adequately protected from a lightning storm when lightning storms are a common occurrence in the summer at the Jersey Shore.”

The New Jersey Utilities Association, which represents JCP&L, PSE&G, and the state’s other electric distribution companies, said the storms were some of the most severe New Jersey had seen in recent years. Heavy rain and winds that approached the force of a hurricane downed trees and wires, prompting the outages.

“These storms were a multi-day, multi-utility crisis that required massive mobilization, but the state’s electric distribution companies’ restoration teams, along with local, county and state emergency personnel, worked around the clock to restore power to over 800,000 customers in just six days,” said Richard Henning, the association’s president and CEO.

He said the industry looks forward to collaborating with the state to boost resilience and improve storm response.

Chris Hoenig, a spokesperson for JCP&L, acknowledged the power outages were disruptive, particularly given that week’s extreme heat, but said the company had marshalled about 5,700 workers to assess damage, fix power lines, and remove downed trees, among other things.

“Four consecutive days of severe thunderstorms, damaging winds and flooding rains caused widespread damage across JCP&L’s service territory, with impacts comparable to those experienced during a hurricane,” Hoenig said. “Throughout the restoration effort, our crews remained focused on a single objective: restoring service safely and as quickly as possible to every affected customer.”

The board on Wednesday also vote to advance an order to show cause that could levy $44.1 million in fines against JCP&L for failing to meet reliability benchmarks in 2022, 2023, and 2024. Commissioner Christine Guhl-Sadovy, the board’s immediate past president, will preside over that case.

“I think that this action really shows, without predetermining any outcome, that we are taking very seriously the utility performance, particularly around these reliability issues and that, when warranted, we are willing to impose penalties,” she said.

Quotation

We expect utilities to be prepared, communicate effectively, and restore service safely and as quickly as possible. When they fall short, the board will hold them accountable.

– Board of Public Utilities President Ben Hertz-Shargel

The board also voted to open procurement for new nuclear power plants.

The vote follows a bill Gov. Mikie Sherrill signed earlier this week that calls for the state to stand up about 1,100 megawatts of new nuclear power to meet rising electricity demand spurred mostly by artificial intelligence data centers.

The governor has championed nuclear power as a method of meeting the state’s energy needs in the long term, though the measure has faced criticism because of the long timelines and high costs associated with nuclear plants and because it calls for those plants to be subsidized by other generators who would pass those expenses on to ratepayers.

“The project is super important, but we just have to be mindful,” said Commissioner Joseph Coviello. “It’s going to be extremely expensive at the start, and it’s only going to get more expensive, so we just have to be mindful of how we spend the ratepayers’ money.”

New Jersey Monitor, the Garden State’s newest news site, provides fair and tough reporting on the issues affecting New Jersey, from political corruption to education to criminal and social justice. The Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and a coalition of donors and readers.