ComEd Highlights 2024 Efforts to Advance the Clean Energy Transition in Northern Illinois

Associated Press

31-01-2025

ComEd is announcing how a series of investments and initiatives in 2024 led to record progress made in terms of enhancing reliability, clean energy access, community investment and jobs, and overall value for over 9 million people served in northern Illinois last year. Even amid record-breaking storms impacting the grid and the region, ComEd continued to deliver best-in-class reliability, connected thousands of customers to new renewable and cleaner energy resources, like solar and EVs, and continued to expand energy efficiency programs that help customers reduce usage and combat climate change.
Additionally, ComEd last year continued its commitment to the communities it serves by growing job training and educational programs to reach thousands of area residents, deploying a record level of financial assistance to those in need, and by securing approval on future investments that will allow the company to continue preparing the region for increased electrification and to support a clean and equitable energy transition for years to come.
'In 2024, ComEd worked hard to modernize northern Illinois' power grid, strengthening its resilience to extreme weather conditions and preparing it to power a cleaner, more electrified economy,' said Gil C. Quiniones, President & CEO of ComEd. 'Thanks to the support of our more than 6,600 dedicated professionals and countless partners, ComEd is positioned to support economic development across the region and to ensure that every community enjoys the benefits of the clean energy transition.'
Learn more about how ComEd made advancements on behalf of its customers and communities in 2024:
Providing best-in-class reliability and resiliency
ComEd earned the 2024 ReliabilityOne® award for Outstanding Reliability Performance in the Midwest Metropolitan Service Area, and a Climate Action Leader award from PA Consulting, a global innovation and transformation consultancy.
ComEd delivered continued reliability in 2024 with nearly 2.3 million customers not experiencing a single outage or interruption – more than half of the customers ComEd serves. Among comparable large utilities in the United States, ComEd delivered the most reliable service.
Smart grid investments helped avoid more than 400,000 outages during a record-breaking summer storm that brought more than 40 tornadoes to the region, prompting crews to work around the clock for one of the fastest large-scale storm restorations in company history.
Since ComEd started smart grid improvements in 2012, it has improved overall reliability by more than 57 percent, helping customers avoid nearly 24.7 million customer interruptions and save more than $4.3 billion in outage-related costs.
Empowering customers for a cleaner and affordable future
ComEd's award-winning Energy Efficiency Program, one of the largest in the nation, reached a new milestone when it surpassed the $10 billion mark in total customer bill savings. The program helps reduce energy consumption and costs and has saved over 89 million megawatt-hours of electricity since its launch in 2008, enough to power more than 10 million ComEd customers' homes for one year and avoid nearly 66 billion pounds of carbon emissions that contribute to climate change.
The electric service total bill rate per kWh of an average ComEd residential customer was 22% below the average residential rate of the top 10 U.S. metropolitan areas, according to the EEI Annual Report.
In 2024, ComEd customers had access to 96 percent clean power on an hourly basis – thanks to a large amount of nuclear generation in the region making our grid one of the cleanest in the nation – and with plans to reach 100 percent thanks to CEJA.
ComEd launched a variety of new clean energy programs to help customers lower costs as they go green – including launching nearly $90 million in customer rebates for the purchase of fleet EVs and the buildout of EV charging infrastructure; and creating a new Go Electric website to empower customers seeking to transition to more efficient heating and cooling systems with information on heat pumps and company rebates offered.
Supporting customers and communities in need
ComEd achieved an overall J.D. Power ranking of 2 (out of 15) in the Midwest for the second consecutive year, an improvement from 8 in 2022.
To reduce the burden for those facing economic hardship, ComEd last year connected more than 229,000 customers to over $133 million in financial assistance and other support options, which is the most support ComEd has provided since the pandemic.
In 2024, ComEd held nearly a half dozen Powering Lives Resource Fairs, providing 1,600 families in underserved neighborhoods with education and tailored support services including bill-assistance options, workforce development opportunities, family care programs, and health screenings. More than three-quarters of those families were successfully connected to financial assistance and other support options.
ComEd provided over $630,000 in grant funding to 90 organizations and municipalities through its Green Region, Powering Safe Communities, Powering the Arts, and Powering the Holidays competitive grant programs.
ComEd employees logged over 26,000 volunteer hours and contributed over $1.8 million to more than 1,200 community-based causes.
ComEd was named a 2024 Customer Champion by Cogent, a division of Escalent, a key market research firm.
Expanding renewables, EV adoption and preparing for a lower-carbon future
2024 saw a record year for growth in solar and distributed generation – from the number of rebates awarded to the volume of new renewable energy sources added to the system. This includes:
356 MW of distributed energy resources (DER), like solar and battery storage systems, were interconnected to the ComEd grid last year alone, the most in any single year to date, and enough energy to power approximately more than 11,800 ComEd homes for one year.
173 rd community solar site livened, enabling more than 32,000 residential customers in northern Illinois to realize the benefits of solar energy and earn credits that reduce their electric bill without having to install solar panels on their homes.
A record $71.6 million in Distributed Generation (DG) Rebates were provided to help offset the out-of-pocket costs related to adding new solar energy in residential, commercial and community solar settings. This is a nearly 800% percent increase from 2019, when only $8 million in rebates were provided.
Boosted home electrification projects – with more than 4,000 heat pump installations funded through ComEd rebates last year; and more than 600 homes electrified through Whole Home Electric program, designed to help low-income customers lower their net energy usage, costs, and carbon footprint with all-electric upgrades to heating and cooling systems and appliances.
ComEd's EV investments helped incentivize the addition of more than 3,500 L2 and DCFC EV charging ports and more than 170 EV fleet vehicles. Over half of the EV funds were distributed to low-income customers and those located or primarily serving equity-eligible investment communities. Additional EV funding programs are available in 2025 at ComEd.com/Clean.
To prepare communities for the growing demand for EVs, ComEd partnered with the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus (MMC) to train more local governments as part of the EV Readiness Program, which has to date helped 41 communities in developing local code and infrastructure plans needed to roll out EVs and charging safely and equitably.
Expanded the integration of EVs, plug-in hybrid EVs, and other electrified equipment to make up nearly one-quarter of ComEd's fleet and closed the year with over 600 EV charging ports across ComEd facilities, a key step as ComEd electrifies its own fleet.
Expanding careers and fueling economic growth for the region
ComEd expanded clean energy and construction job training – including the launching of the new ComEd Market Development Initiative, helping more than 80 job seekers and local entrepreneurs become certified to work in the burgeoning energy-efficiency industry; and by creating new construction and technical job training programs, like Power Up Academy, to help collectively reach nearly 1,000 local residents with career training last year alone.
Continued to expand hiring to fill critical trades roles, with 135 new craft hires onboarded last year, bringing hiring of new entry-level trades jobs to more than 1,000 since a 2018 agreement was signed with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 15.
To spark economic development, in 2024, ComEd brought 15 commercial projects to northern Illinois, with planned projects set to add nearly 1,400 jobs and more than $17 billion in local investment.
Companies continue to invest in the region thanks to the unparalleled access to clean, affordable and highly reliable power, with ComEd being recognized by Site Selection Magazine as a National Leader on driving jobs and investment to Illinois.
The company's track record of successful project execution, in combination with growing interest in the clean energy attributes uniquely found in our region, has led to an unprecedented volume of high-density load requests last year. This includes more than 40 large-load projects currently in the engineering or construction phase and expected to come online in the years ahead, and with continued interest from developers and high growth industries looking to power new or expanded business development projects in the region.
Building the next generation of STEM talent
To improve representation in STEM careers, ComEd provided educational opportunities to more than 1,400 in 2024. These programs included:
ComEd's Black History Month STEM Labs, where 75 high school students worked with ComEd mentors to build personal Bluetooth speakers and learn more about STEM careers. Each student also received a $250 scholarship.
ComEd's Hispanic Heritage Month STEM Labs, where 50 high school students worked with ComEd mentors to build small robots and learn more about STEM careers. Each student also received a $250 scholarship.
ComEd's ASME DropMEin! Program, where 142 middle school students met ComEd employees to foster the engineering mindset and learn about power generation, energy sustainability, emerging technologies and utility career paths.
ComEd's Learning from Leaders, where 577 middle and high school students connected with ComEd STEM professionals to learn about career and education paths, what ComEd does, and the importance of STEM.
ComEd's Power of STEM, where 487 middle and high school students worked with ComEd mentors to learn about microgrids, solar energy and climate change.
ComEd's Create a Spark program, where 75 high school students learned how to complete transmission and distribution projects and about climate impact.
The ComEd Scholars program provided $340,000 in scholarships to 9 students pursuing STEM degrees at either Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), DePaul University, or Chicago State University (CSU).
ComEd is a unit of Chicago-based Exelon Corporation (NASDAQ: EXC), a Fortune 200 energy company serving more than 10.5 million electricity and natural gas customers – the largest number of customers in the U.S. ComEd powers the lives of more than 4 million customers across northern Illinois, or 70 percent of the state's population. For more information visit ComEd.com, and connect with the company on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, and YouTube.
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SOURCE: ComEd
Copyright Business Wire 2025.
PUB: 01/31/2025 03:01 PM/DISC: 01/31/2025 03:01 PM