Thursday, October 1, 2026
The story of Long Island’s energy infrastructure is one of growth, ambition, missteps and resilience.
From the development of the Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) and the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) to handle a growing need, to key historical events like the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant saga and Hurricane Sandy, Long Island’s power grid has a storied history.
Understanding how Long Island was electrified—and why its grid now faces urgent modernization needs—offers critical context for where its energy future is headed.
In the early 1900s, Long Island grew from rural communities to thriving suburbs outside of New York City. Early electrification arrived town by town, driven by small, private companies like Perkins Electric Co., Northport Electric Light and the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR).
Early power plants, like the one owned by Perkins Electric Co., used water power to turn dynamos, supplemented by a steam turbine.
To meet demand for the post–World War II housing booms, a centralized model of power generation was needed, leading to large plants that would feed neighborhoods through overhead transmission and distribution lines. As with the rest of the country, coal became the primary fuel source to power the steam turbines.
Around 1910, LILCO was created by combining four small Suffolk County utility companies to make improvements on the existing system to deliver electric power. For much of its history, LILCO focused on large, centralized fossil-fuel power plants supported by an expanding grid.
By the 1920s, LILCO expanded into Nassau, Suffolk and Rockaway, eventually serving 2.8 million people. Long before the adverse effects of climate change would be felt, the dangerous choice to rely on fossil fuels was evident in the Bay Shore gas explosion in 1919, knocking out power for three days.
About two decades later, debilitating hurricanes in 1938 and 1944 sparked heavy scrutiny from the public and raised red flags for the New York Public Service Commission on the stability of the system.
Through the 1950s and 60s, the negative effects were felt to a greater impact. Most famously the New York smog event of 1966, where air pollution from coal power plants and other sources led to poisonous air quality, severe health impacts and deaths.
While plagued by these negative public health circumstances, this system did meet the energy demand of the day. But, in the 1960s and ‘70s, the development of air conditioning made demand for electric power skyrocket. LILCO’s answer? The Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant.
The Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant was constructed, but was met with public opposition and significant safety concern studies.
The plant was estimated to cost $65 - $75 million in 1966 and included a proposed additional nuclear facility in Lloyd Harbor that was later nixed. Though the Environmental Policy Act forced developers to guarantee no ecological harm would come from building these types of facilities, public outcry continued.
The 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania amplified these concerns, broadening them from local community members to state officials. Construction finished on Shoreham in 1984, ballooning from the original estimation to $4.6 billion, almost six times more expensive than originally estimated.
Though completed, and still reflected on Long Island ratepayers utility bills, Shoreham never operated commercially, and it became a national symbol of failed centralized energy planning. Ultimately, the plant was decommissioned, leaving Long Islanders with debt—and a lasting skepticism toward large, single-point energy solutions.
The changing climate and increase in natural disasters have repeatedly exposed the fragility of Long Island’s infrastructure.
From 1985’s Hurricane Gloria that knocked out electricity to two-thirds of LILCO’s customers, to the Northeast blackout of 2003 that halted the Long Island Rail Road, to Hurricane Sandy in 2012 where 90 percent of Long Island lost power, to every tropical storm and weather event in between, these natural disasters continued to expose deep flaws in the aging infrastructure.
Each event compounded existing wear on the system, accelerating the need for reinforcement, storm hardening, smarter grid design and diversity of energy sources—while costing a premium to do so. These moments also reshaped public expectations: reliability is no longer just about everyday demand, but about resilience under extreme conditions.
As a result of the Long Island Power Act of 1985, the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) was created to assume responsibility for LILCO’s debt, which totaled around $7.3 billion, and the infrastructure. LIPA inherited a vast, but inadequate grid that must be upgraded.
The power grid of 100 years ago is still the grid Long Island uses today. While LIPA has taken great strides to maintain reliability at affordable power rates, the generating sources still revolve largely around imported power from centralized generating stations.
As the AI and data-center revolution demand more and more of our power grid, and new technologies have become available, namely renewables like wind, solar and battery storage, Long Island has the opportunity to transform to a modern, affordable and resilient power grid.
