ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Duke Energy’s year-round grid-strengthening work and advanced technology help keep Florida communities resilient and better protected against disasters such as hurricanes.

“Regardless of when and where the next storm strikes,” said Melissa Seixas, Duke Energy Florida state president, “Duke Energy is ready, and we encourage our customers to take this time to reassess and communicate their emergency response plans with their families, friends, neighbors and employees.”

According to the National Hurricane Center, the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season is Sept. 10, with most activity occurring between mid-August and mid-October.

Hurricane Debby, a powerful Category 1 storm, made an early landfall in Florida’s Big Bend on Aug. 5. Duke Energy’s Storm Protection Plan, including its advanced self-healing technology and year-round infrastructure work, is making a difference when it comes to improving reliability.

During Hurricane Debby, the company’s self-healing technology saved more than 12.5 million minutes of customer total outage time and automatically restored more than 62,000 customer outages.

While a self-healing system can’t repair the physical damage to the power line that a human crew must repair, it can reduce the number of customers affected by a power outage by up to 75% and can often restore power in less than a minute. More than 76% of Duke Energy Florida customers are served by this technology.

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For more on hurricane season and the utility industry, see how Duke Energy is strengthening the grid,  ask yourself if you are making these heat related illness mistakes, and make sure you are stocked up on the must haves for storm season.