Sequestered in power plants or at-home call centers: Consumers Energy in the age of COVID-19
Consumers Energy CEO Patti Poppe charted her utility’s path through the COVID-19 pandemic on Thursday, what will be necessary going forward, and how the crisis has impacted the business community.
Consumers Energy is Michigan’s largest energy provider and has been deemed an essential service by the state. While much of the state lingers in a stay home, stay safe order – an order to be extended by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer this afternoon and supported by Consumers – the utility’s entire structure has continued to operate, albeit through new forms.
Lineworkers are out on the roadside and contact centers are fielding calls day and night. Yet those taking the calls are no longer packed into service centers but are taking those calls remotely. Lineworkers are reporting to duty straight from their own homes, but practicing social distancing on the job. Those who have it the roughest, however, are those guaranteeing the power flow.
“We want to make sure we have continual flow of electricity and natural gas to power hospitals, groceries, all of our vital services,” Poppe said during a teleconference with the Detroit Regional Chamber on Thursday. “We want to make sure we have continual flow, so our teams are safer on-site than off. It reduces the variable of them being exposed to the virus off-site.”
Workers at critical sites like power plants have been in quarantine since the early days of the crisis, living and working out of the same location. They have on-site campers to sleep in at night where not even their families can visit. Poppe praised her employees for committing to such a life, and for helping a state that is counting on them.
The company’s call center is providing advice to small businesses to foster knowledge of and access to resources. The sheer number of resources can be daunting, Poppe acknowledged, and some can slip through the cracks, so Consumers is working to keep people apprised of everything from a payroll protection plan to disaster loans. Small businesses have been a particular focus as they have been some of the hardest hit by closures and restrictions.
“The three things that are most vital to maintain liquidity and come out of this crisis are: cost of their facilities, payroll and utilities,” Poppe said. “We know if we can help them reduce that usage dramatically, that helps reduce their exposure,” while helping them access or defer payments.
Consumers has a specific 1-800 number set up purely for their use, while residential customers in need are still encouraged to ring the utility’s traditional call center. For those residential customers, any service shutoffs for the most vulnerable and senior citizen customers have been deferred by Consumers until at least May 3.
As Poppe explained, “Shut-off protections are in place so people can be safe during this time. We had them in place through May 3 for low-income and senior citizens who are most vulnerable. We have not been initiating shut-offs for other customers as well, but we will begin communicating with customers at some point. We will return to doing shut off notifications at some point, but first and foremost, we’re a supporter of keeping people safe.”
The state’s second-largest utility has followed suit on several of these fronts, with DTE Energy tapping its DTE Energy Foundation to support 360 small businesses and more than 1,000 nonprofits. In addition, the company is bolstering the state’s supply of personal protective equipment with some 100,000 KN95 respirator masks. Those masks have been delivered to area hospitals and 2 million more are on order.
“The DTE Foundation is pulling out all the stops to help protect the heroes of our communities,” Jerry Norcia, DTE President and CEO, said. “For weeks, the DTE Foundation and its partners have been feeding Michiganders and equipping first responders. Now, thanks to the tenacity of our remarkable supply chain team, we can protect the Detroit-area health care workers who are on the front lines of this pandemic.”
All across the country, there has been a notable sense of two Americas emerging from the crisis, one advocating for a return to normalcy and work as soon as possible for the sake of the economy, the other pushing for all that is necessary to keep the disease from spreading. For her part, Poppe has been a firm supporter for the stay-at-home order issued by Whitmer.
“We have a unique seat,” Poppe said. “We see families, businesses; we’re actually physically connected to our friends, our families, our factories with a pipe or a wire. We can see firsthand the effect this is having on them through the lens of their energy usage. I will tell you that stay home, stay safe order is working.”
Being a part of a utility, however, makes it impossible not to see the strain and stress on small businesses throughout the state, Poppe noted. The economic effect has been significant, in her view, and small businesses need access to emergency funding – but the health crisis must be addressed first.
The state reported 20,346 cases of COVID-19 in Michigan as of Wednesday.
