The state’s utility watchdog petitioned the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to investigate NIPSCO. It is the main power provider in Northwest Indiana, where severe storms and straight-line winds slammed the region Aug. 11 and left over 300,000 people without power — including 95% of Lake County. Trees falling on powerlines caused much of the damage. It was the largest outage in NIPSCO’s history.
The Office of Utility Consumer Counselor, the watchdog that advocates for ratepayers, filed the petition with the IURC on Aug. 25, after Gov. Mike Braun called for an investigation into the power company’s vegetation management practices.
“Given the intensity of the storm event, the magnitude of the outages and the extended periods of time for restoration, the OUCC requests the Commission open an investigation so the Commission, the OUCC and all stakeholders have an opportunity to discover what efforts NIPSCO took, both in preparation for and following the aforementioned storm, to mitigate damages and to restore power to customers,” the petition said.
Thursday evening, NIPSCO wrote on social media it is suspending customer disconnections and collection of payment through Sep. 30, and with the NiSource Charitable Foundation, will donate $2 million to nonprofits focused on recovery work in Northwest Indiana.
“Storm restoration efforts related to the Aug. 11 storm and subsequent weather events are substantially complete. While crews continue working through a limited number of individual outage cases, restoration activities have concluded across the broader service territory,” the company said in a Friday morning update. “We remain committed to restoring service to every customer as quickly and safely as possible and will continue to address any remaining outages.”
Fewer than 80 customers had outages as of Friday morning.
The OUCC’s petition asks the IURC to “review NIPSCO’s storm-restoration practices and procedures” and confirm how the company has spent vegetation management and other funding sourced from customers “to support the reliability and resilience of NIPSCO’s infrastructure.”
In the petition, the OUCC says NIPSCO was authorized to spend over almost $77 million on vegetation management from 2023-2025, and over $2 billion on infrastructure upgrades and reliability since 2016.
The IURC has statutory authority to conduct investigations under Indiana Code.
“At this time, the Commission hasn’t officially launched an investigation into NIPSCO regarding its storm response. Based on the Governor’s announcement yesterday, we anticipate that a request will come from the Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Counselor, and while I can’t speculate on the timing or what the Commission will do, we will review that request carefully and then determine next steps,” said IURC spokesperson Ben Gavelek in an email to WFYI on Tuesday evening.
The next day, the IURC held its regular weekly meeting and didn’t announce an investigation.
The petition requested that the IURC make NIPSCO a party and set a formal procedural schedule to gather testimony and evidence. Without a formal investigation, the commission cannot order binding actions on a regulated utility.
The company did not immediately respond to a WFYI request for comment by publication.
Contact WFYI data journalist Zak Cassel at zcassel@wfyi.org
