September is National Preparedness Month, and as the recent series of historically intense hurricanes demonstrated, being prepared for emergency situations is more important than ever. That’s why Pepco prepares year round for powerful weather events like hurricanes, super storms, and snow storms.

Here are five things you need to know about the preventative work we do to prep for major storms:

1. Since 2012, we spent approximately $1.4 billion in making our infrastructure more resilient to severe weather events – upgrading underground lines in D.C. and Maryland; installing advanced switches to limit outages; and adding smart meters providing remote outage detection.
2. Our enhanced mobile app brings upgraded service to our customers’ fingertips. The app makes it easy for customers to access outage information and contact Pepco in the event of an outage. You can download it now here.
3. Working together with our communities, we engage in coordinated preparation for powerful storms. We continuously partner with the Red Cross and National Weather Service to host Summer Preparedness Conferences and share tips for building storm preparedness kits. 
4. Our trucks include mobile data terminals so line workers in the field can respond faster to outage events.
5. Our teams monitor forecasts around the clock to be ready to respond for our customers when a significant weather event occurs. In 2016, our three utilities received and evaluated more than 2,000 weather reports and alerts, making us more agile in the face of storms.

We’re also helping others in our industry respond to the effects of severe storms. More than 2,000 utility workers across the Exelon family of companies, including Pepco, mobilized to assist in restoration efforts in Florida following Hurricane Irma.

With constant preparation and our partnerships in the community, Pepco is delivering on our purpose: to provide reliable, resilient service, especially through this hurricane season’s storms.