The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on March 22 recognized PSE&G for its extraordinary efforts to recycle hazardous lead-clad cable and remove more than 1.3 million pounds of lead from the environment. This is the second time that PSE&G has won one of the EPA's National Partnership for Environmental Priorities (NPEP) awards, a result of setting and exceeding voluntary goals.
"We are proud to once again be recognized by the federal government for work to recycle and reuse," said Eric Svenson, PSEG's vice president for policy and environment, health and safety. "We've long been committed to sustainability, and this award is validation of our leadership in that area."
PSE&G exceeded its most recent NPEP goal by removing over 1.3 million pounds of lead contained within paper insulated lead cable (PILC) and replacing it with lead-free ethylene propylene rubber (EPR) cable. PILC is proactively removed after system failures, other maintenance activities, or during infrastructure upgrades, which helps ensure the aging cable system does not impact continued high system reliability. The lead was sent to a scrap metal recycling facility and then to a smelter for reuse as raw material.
PSE&G worked with vendors to establish a new method of calculating and tracking the amount of lead removed and recycled from its cable. The PILC replacement process has become standard practice for the utility.
PSEG has invested approximately $100 million in 30 megawatts of solar in three large-scale projects in Florida, Ohio and New Jersey. The company is also developing a 350-megawatt wind farm off the coast of southern New Jersey and investing in compressed air energy storage through a partnership with Energy Storage & Power (ES&P).
In addition, PSE&G, the company's regulated electric and gas utility, has two solar initiatives, including a $105 million solar loan program and another called Solar4All, an 80-megawatt program that involves attaching grid-connected solar panels to 200,000 utility poles in neighborhoods across New Jersey.
The NPEP is an EPA program focused on reducing the use of potentially hazardous chemicals from products and processes. By partnering with the EPA, NPEP partners from industry, business and municipalities are recycling and reducing the use of toxic chemicals. NPEP strives to improve chemical management to reduce the potential release of chemicals that could affect human and environmental health. NPEP is part of the EPA's Resource Conservation Challenge (RCC), a national effort to conserve natural resources and energy by managing materials more efficiently.
PSEG aims to be recognized for its leadership in providing safe, reliable, economic and green energy. The company was recently named to the Dow Jones Sustainability North America Index (DJSI North America) for the second year in a row.
Public Service Electric and Gas Company (PSE&G) is New Jersey's oldest and largest regulated gas and electric delivery utility, serving nearly three-quarters of the state's population. PSE&G is the winner of the ReliabilityOne Award for superior electric system reliability. PSE&G is a subsidiary of Public Service Enterprise Group Incorporated (PSEG), a diversified energy company.
