电力公司如何让飓风后的纽约重现光明

    首席执行官布克最艰难的任务或许还在前方。该公司股价在飓风后已下跌了10%，总市值缩水近20亿美元。公用事业公司没有像苹果（Apple）这样的公司增长率，它们通过持续稳定的盈利和高派息吸引投资者。布克必须要说服投资者，遭遇更多的风暴不会改变这一点，至少近期内是这样。Con Ed的一个解决办法是将曼哈顿以外地区的架空输电线埋入地下，将靠近水边的电力设施用砖墙围起来，不只是依赖沙袋和防洪墙。这将耗费数十亿美元资金。飓风过后几天，布克说，他并不认为这些花费是必须的。

    与此同时，Con Ed必须确保其电网能继续满足一个不断发展的城市的需求，精通科技的城市居民已日益依赖需要经常充电的各种电子设备，这可能是电力汽车时代即将到来的先兆。据报道，库默正在寻求升级地区电网，希望能更快更好地查找断电点，做出应对。“它们是美国最好的公用事业公司之一，”匹斯堡大学（University of Pittsburgh）能源中心负责人格雷格•瑞德表示。“但事实是，像其他公司一样，它们的员工也在老龄化。”

    不管怎么说，如果投资者希望检验布克和他的团队是否能解决这家公司面临的最大问题，飓风桑迪提供了一个机会。

    译者：早稻米

    CEO Burke's most difficult task may still lie ahead. The company's shares have fallen 10% in the wake of the storm, erasing nearly $2 billion of the company's value. Utilities don't have the same growth prospects of say an Apple. Instead, they attract investors with consistent earnings and high dividends. Burke will have to convince investors that being at the mercy, at least recently, of more and more storms won't change that. One answer is for Con Ed to bury the overhead power lines it has outside of Manhattan and enclose its power facilities near water behind brick walls instead of just relying on sandbags and flood walls. That will cost billions. Just days after making it through the storm, Burke says he doesn't think the expense is necessary.

    At the same time, Con Ed has to make sure its grid can continue to serve a growing city filled with a tech-savvy population increasingly dependent on a slew of electronic devices that are seemingly in constant need of a charge, on what could be the dawn of the era of the electric car. Cuomo is reportedly looking to upgrade the region's power grid with one would be better able to pinpoint power failures and respond to them. "They are one of the best utilities in America," says Greg Reed, who heads up the Center for Energy at the University of Pittsburgh. "But the fact is like everyone else their stuff is aging."

    Nonetheless, if investors were looking for a test to see if Burke and his team were up to the task of solving the company's biggest problems, Hurricane Sandy provided it.