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Utilities and energy companies to keep close eye

Houston — In a late July 31 advisory, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center said heavy rains associated with Hurricane Isaias could begin to affect south and east central Florida late Friday night and the eastern Carolinas by early next week, potentially resulting in isolated flash flooding.

NOAA said the Category 1 hurricane was expected to reach the east coast of Florida on Saturday morning.

It said that storm surge along the northeastern Florida coast could come late in the weekend, and spread northward along the remainder of the US East Coast through early next week.

Florida Power & Light said July 31 it had a restoration workforce of more than 10,000 “ready to respond to Hurricane Isaias amid the global COVID-19 pandemic.”

It said it will bring in crews from sister company Gulf Power and has secured more than 2,000 additional restoration personnel from nearly 10 states. “We are committed to restoring service in between bands of severe weather, as long as winds are below 35 MPH,” the company said.

FPL owns the two-reactor, 1,600-MW Turkey Point Nuclear Generating Station located two miles east of Homestead, Florida, and about 25 miles south of Miami.

According to preliminary mapping of Isaias’ path, the Turkey Point facility may escape the storm’s more severe western rain bands on Saturday.

FPL’s 1,880-MW St. Lucie Nuclear facility located further up the Florida coast on Hutchinson Island, may not be so lucky. The center of the storm eye could pass offshore of the St. Lucie facility early on Sunday morning.

In a statement, Duke Energy Florida said it believed its customers in central and eastern Florida may experience weather-related outages. …… https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/natural-gas/073120-hurricane-isaias-projected-to-strafe-eastern-side-of-florida-over-the-weekend