Long Island Power Authority (LIPA, "lie-pah") is a municipal subdivision of the State of New York that owns the electric transmission and electric distribution system serving all of Long Island and a portion of Queens in New York City known as the Rockaways.
History
LIPA was originally created under the Long Island Power Act of 1985 to acquire the Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO)'s electric and natural gas infrastructure. LIPA acquired LILCO's transmission system in May 1998.
Before 2014, LIPA's electric and natural gas infrastructure was run under its own name, though KeySpan operated its electric and natural gas infrastructure under a prior management contract with LIPA until 2007. KeySpan merged with National Grid USA in 2007, and National Grid began operating the electric infrastructure portion of LIPA business until 2013.
Since January 1, 2014, LIPA has contracted with New Jersey–based Public Service Enterprise Group to operate LIPA's electric infrastructure on LIPA's behalf for a period of 12 years. National Grid handed control of the electric infrastructure portion of LIPA business to PSEG at the close of business on December 31, 2013. KeySpan still operates the natural gas infrastructure on Long Island.
Services
LIPA's Long Island electric system provides service to over 1.2 million customers in Nassau and Suffolk counties and the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens. LIPA does not own or operate any generation plants or retail natural gas assets on Long Island, although many generation plants are under contract to LIPA to meet its power supply needs. LIPA is listed as the "Owner, Operator and/or Billing Organization" for 27 electric power generation facilities located on Long Island in the 2018 NYISO Gold Book, for a total of about 5,048 megawatts (MW) of nameplate capacity.
Organization
LIPA is run by a 9-member board of trustees. The LIPA management team is headed by John Rhodes who was appointed Acting CEO in March 2024. Tracey Edwards is the chairwoman of LIPA's Board of Trustees, appointed by Governor Kathy Hochul in November 2023.
In 2017, LIPA had operating expenses of $3.214 billion, an outstanding debt of $3.574 billion, and a level of staffing of 54 people. Although Public Service Law Section 3-b grants the New York State Public Service Commission the ability to review and make recommendations in regards to LIPA's electric retail rates and spending, the NYSPSC does not have the power to set those rates or expenditure levels. It can, however, inspect LIPA's facilities, books, and records. The New York State Public Service Commission runs its own field office on Long Island to enforce this recommendation and inspection capability.
On January 24, 2007, then-governor Eliot Spitzer announced that Kevin Law would replace Richard Kessel as chairman of LIPA until the fall, when a new chairman would be named and Law would become chief executive officer of LIPA. On October 8, 2007, Law took over as president and CEO, but stepped down on September 1, 2010, in order to become the president of the Long Island Association.
Facilities
LIPA owns electric transmission and distribution lines with the following voltages:
- Transmission: 345-kilovolts (kV) and 138-kV
- Distribution: 69-kV, 33-kV, 23-kV, 13.2-kV and 4.16-kV
Power vendors
LIPA does not own or operate any generation plants or retail natural gas assets on Long Island, although many generation plants are under contract to LIPA to meet its power supply needs. The following table lists generating resources in NYISO Region K, corresponding to Long Island, with nonzero net energy generated in 2020:
{| class="wikitable sortable"
!Operator
!Facility
!Location
!Nameplate rating (MW)
!Net energy in 2020 (GWh)
!Add'l refs
|-
| rowspan="4" |National Grid
|Northport Power Station
|Fort Salonga
| rowspan="4" |3945.4
| rowspan="4" |5099.1
| rowspan="4" |
|-
|E. F. Barrett Power Station
|Barnum Island
|-
|Port Jefferson Power Station
|Port Jefferson
|-
|Other facilities (gas turbine, jet engine, and internal combustion units)
|Glenwood Landing, Holtsville, Shoreham, East Hampton North, Southold, West Babylon, Southampton
|-
|Caithness Energy
|Caithness Long Island Energy Center
|Yaphank
|375.0
|2171.3
|
|-
| rowspan="2" |Reworld
|Reworld Hempstead
|Uniondale
| rowspan="2" |136.1
| rowspan="2" |958.3
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Three other waste-to-energy plants
|East Northport, Wyandanch, Ronkonkoma
|-
| rowspan="2" |New York Power Authority
|Richard M. Flynn Power Plant
|Holtsville
| rowspan="2" |223.8
| rowspan="2" |645.9
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Gas turbine unit
|Brentwood
|-
| rowspan="2" |Calpine Energy Services
|Bethpage Energy Center
|Bethpage
| rowspan="2" |286.6
| rowspan="2" |539.8
| rowspan="2" |
|-
|Gas turbine unit
|Stony Brook
|-
|J-Power
|Five gas turbine and one combined cycle units
|Brentwood, Shoreham, Babylon, Freeport
|342
|306.7
|
|-
|Nassau Energy Corporation
|Combined cycle unit
|Uniondale
|55.0
|160.1
|
|-
|MPH Rockaway Peakers
|Two jet engine units
|Far Rockaway, Jamaica Bay
|121
|108.6
|
|-
|Hawkeye Energy
|Jet engine unit
|Greenport
|54.0
|51.8
|
|-
|BP Solar
|Long Island Solar Farm
|Brookhaven National Laboratory (Upton)
|31.5
|48.5
|
|-
|Village of Freeport
|Two gas turbine units
|Freeport
|76.8
|10.2
|
|-
|Village of Rockville Centre
|Charles P. Keller facility (internal combustion units)
|Rockville Centre
|31.4
|0.9
|
|}