Free Republic

The Massachusetts attorney general is seeking a nearly $10 million in fines from electric utility NStar for what she calls "inadequate" responses to two major storms last year that left hundreds of thousands of customers without power, some for days. Attorney General Martha Coakley's office made the recommendation in a brief filed Tuesday with the Department of Public Utilities, which has the authority to impose the fine. The attorney general says NStar failed to properly anticipate the severity of Tropical Storm Irene in August and a late October snow storm; failed to communicate effectively with customers and government officials; and...

Even as electricity flowed again Thursday to most power-starved pockets of the Back Bay, one of the city’s signature office towers remained dark for most of the day, and questions intensified about why NStar repeatedly changed its predictions for restoring power. The utility at one point insisted that nearly all 21,000 business and residential customers who lost power after a billowing transformer fire Tuesday had been reconnected. The one exception — and it was a big one — was the sprawling Prudential Center, which remained closed for much of the day and, in the process, disrupted the lives of about...

Three manholes on Huntington Avenue exploded today, sending flames shooting out of the steel covers as Nstar officials had just finished announcing all the power in the area had been restored — except to the Prudential Tower. Boston Fire Department spokesman Steve MacDonald said one manhole had “flames coming out of it” and it was put out. The manhole was still seen smoking this afternoon. Nstar spokesman Michael Durand said a sudden “high demand” for electricity, caused when workers powered up nearby homes and businesses, caused a series of permanent cables to fail, sparking the explosions. It knocked out power...

Residents, workers, and tourists in the Back Bay swapped stories of the blackout and tried to get back to their normal routines today, with varying degrees of success, in the wake of a transformer fire Tuesday that knocked out power to thousands in the area. Power was out in some businesses, but on in others. Businesses were closed on one block of Newbury Street, with signs posted in the windows, while in the next block, shops were open and cafes were serving food. Lovenia Thomas, 73, who lives on the 11th floor of a Dartmouth Street subsidized housing complex said...

Gov. Deval Patrick yesterday announced that NStar [NST] — as part of its bid to merge with Connecticut-based Northeast Utilities — has agreed to buy 27.5 percent of the electricity that will be generated by the yet-to-be-built Cape Wind project. And by “agreed” we really mean “succumbed to unprecedented pressure from Patrick’s team, designed to ensure that the offshore wind project may some day, with enough government coaxing, actually break ground.”