Introduction to Consolidated Edison
Consolidated Edison (Con Edison) is an investor-owned energy company that provides electric and gas service to the residents and businesses of New York City and Westchester County, and steam service to businesses in Manhattan. Con Edison connects more than 4.5 million customers to energy sources and serves almost 40% of New York State’s electric demand while only covering about 1% of the state’s geographic footprint.
Con Edison serves approximately 3.4 million electricity customers and approximately 1.1 million natural gas customers in its service territory.
System Overview
Con Edison’s system serves customers in five boroughs of New York City and Westchester County located directly north of New York City. Con Edison’s system is different than other utilities in New York State because it has an extensive underground, networked distribution system. This system poses unique challenges to DER implementation, as listed below:
- The network system requires special consideration when integrating DER to provide load relief at the distribution level as compared to non-network systems.
- High load density and network design can absorb DG interconnection more readily than non-network systems by spreading the power in multiple directions, but the efficacy of the relief provided by such DER is lessened for these same reasons.
- The cost of the portfolio of DER solutions for networked systems is higher to meet load relief needs.
In New York City, Con Edison covers more than 750,000 buildings and 3 million housing units that encompass approximately 5 billion square feet of floor space. In Westchester, Con Edison’s coverage includes approximately 30,000 businesses and organizations and 350,000 housing units within 450 square miles.
| Customer Type |
Customers |
Load (MWh) |
| Electric1 |
| Residential |
2,959,949 |
13,770,622 |
| Commercial |
558,227 |
38,418,413 |
| Industrial |
743 |
509,021 |
| Total |
3,518,921 |
52,698,056 |
| Gas |
| Total Residential & Commercial |
1,100,000 |
– |
Energy use is forecasted to stay constant in Con Edison’s service territory, while peak demand is expected to continue increasing. Peak demand inclusive of DER is expected to remain flat with only minor increases.
As of November 2020, Con Edison has installed 2,664,989 electric AMI meters and 597,621 gas communication modules. AMI deployment is completed in Staten Island and Westchester County, with deployment in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Bronx, and Queens underway. A total of 4.7 million smart meters will be deployed by 2022.
Approach to the Climate Act
Con Edison’s vision is aligned with Climate Act targets and expects that supporting investments to achieve them will continue by leveraging the DSP capabilities that have been implemented or are in progress.
- Con Edison will continue to further enable the secure, safe, and rapid integration of DER, and to enable dynamic network management and interface with DER.
- Con Edison strives to expand information services with the guiding principles of enhancing customer value and attaining the Climate Act’s emission goals.
- Con Edison supports a more competitive, transparent marketplace for distribution-level electric services that delivers efficient outcomes for investment and operation at the lowest cost to customers.
Notable initiatives include:
