Water Use & Conservation

The city’s water is supplied from three upstate reservoir systems (Delaware, Catskill, and Croton) that have a combined capacity of 550 billion gallons of water, according to the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP). Projections from the Company’s updated 2023 Climate Change Vulnerability Study predict that precipitation will increase in the coming years, including a higher rate of extreme precipitation events. In 2024, we are committed to reviewing our role in water management to protect water quality, reducing water consumption, to working within our communities in developing our water management programs. The vast majority of CECONY’s water footprint is converted into a product, steam, which is an integral source of efficient energy.

Steam is distributed to our customers for a variety of uses, such as heat, hot water, air conditioning, sterilization, and food processing. As one of NYCDEP’s largest water customers, we are committed to minimizing the amount of water used to produce steam. We aim to reduce our water footprint by improving the efficiency of our steam system and implementing water treatment system enhancements. As part of our policy, personnel in Steam Operations use water efficiently and economically at all times, and management oversees the water use program. Currently, Steam Operations tracks water usage versus steam produced to manage overall water consumption. It is anticipated that monthly data will be tracked and trended. We are in the process of realigning targets due to new treatment systems and operating profiles. If drought conditions impact our operations, Steam Operations has a drought emergency procedure that requires the stations to monitor water use and comply with water-use restrictions.

The vast majority of CECONY’s water footprint is converted into a product, steam, which is an integral source of efficient energy.

Our water use has decreased by more than 20% over the past decade. This is due in part to a decrease in demand for steam,but also to and several major technology upgrades that have reduced our water consumption in ways that continue into 2024. At the East River Generating Station, we completed the installation of ultrafiltration (UF) and reverse-osmosis (RO) filtration systems for two of our generating units. Before upgrading the system to include UF, larger amounts of water and chemicals were required to maintain operating performance. Now, our UF and RO filtration systems efficiently remove minerals and debris from the water, enabling us to reduce our overall water consumption and use water more efficiently. We are already seeing savings of approximately 10 million gallons of water each month and expect to see more savings as we continue upgrading the RO filtration systems at the station in 2024.

As part of our decarbonization efforts, we are evaluating and starting to implement various energy efficiency measures on our production side, distribution side and customer side that are expected to improve our performance and reduce steam usage and water usage. Specifically, we have existing energy efficiency programs as well as proposed steam energy efficiency programs that will reduce our overall water consumption through reduced customer demand. At East River Generating Station, we continue to work to increase the recovery of the RO system to exceed 90% through a project that was implemented in June 2023 along with a research and development effort that is looking to incorporate Capacitive Electrodialysis Reversal (C-EDR) treatment technology into the water treatment process. This technology can purify water that is currently discarded as part of the water treatment process so that it can be reused to create steam. The water used to produce steam must be exceptionally pure. The current process results in a certain amount of reject water from the RO system that is properly discharged as effluent in accordance with applicable permits. C-EDR has the potential to refilter 95% of the RO reject water to be of sufficient quality to be sent to the final water treatment stage to produce steam. C-EDR reduces energy consumption while providing high quality boiler and steam distribution make up water at a fraction of the cost of existing RO or demineralizer technologies. We are preparing to pilot C-EDR at several locations in our water treatment process at the start of 2024.

Con Edison Steam Operations - DEP Municipal Water Use (billion gallons)

4

3

2

1

2011

0.18

0.91

2.53

2012

0.15

0.98

2.38

2013

0.17

0.96

2.55

2014

0.22

0.84

2.62

2015

0.24

0.78

2.47

2016

0.29

1.01

2.31

2017

0.30

0.99

2.32

2018

0.34

0.62

2.40

2019

0.15

0.88

2.32

2020

0.12

0.63

2.00

2021

0.14

0.60

2.09

2022

0.13

0.74

2.22

2023

0.11

0.79

1.91

• Water Used to Produce Electricity
• Water Used to Produce Steam
• Steam Purchased by Customers

Note: This chart displays steam operations data only. 
On average, more than 65% of Steam Operations’ water footprint is distributed to customers as steam energy.

Water Quality and Effluent Management

At Con Edison, it is our policy to comply with all federal, state, and local wastewater discharge regulations . At CECONY, we responsibly manage our effluent, which is primarily discharged from our steam plants into the Hudson River or East River. Every CECONY steam plant has a State Pollution Discharge Elimination System (SPDES) permit from the NYSDEC that allows our facilities to discharge water into the river, subject to designated criteria for each station. The SPDES permit specifies the location, sample type, frequency, and limit(s) of each effluent parameter to be monitored and establishes effluent parameters and discharge limitations for pollutants. Each facility monitors compliance with these limitations and other requirements through continuous monitoring and sampling as specified in the permit and reports the results to the NYSDEC. In addition, the Company has detailed incident response and corrective action policies and plans in place to comply with its SPDES permits, and a non-compliance with any SPDES permit requirement is reported promptly.

Preventing Spills to Waterways

Utility operations entail the use of certain equipment that contains oil. These operations include the storage of petroleum fuels needed to maintain utility service during gas supply contingencies and the use of dielectric fluids (mineral oil or natural and synthetic esters) to provide electrical insulation, suppress arcing and serve as a coolant for operating equipment. Although the risk is still present in our operations, CECONY has robust plans designed to contain oil spills as quickly as possible before they reach waterways and impact the aquatic environment. In 2023, CECONY completed 108 Spill Prevention and Countermeasure Control (SPCC) inspections and recertified 83 EPA-mandated SPCC plans. Additionally, CECONY has completed construction of 320 containment structures for oil-containing large power transformers (LPTs) in Area Substations.

CECONY and O&R also maintain spill prevention, management, and reporting measures. These include leak detection systems; oil- filled asset monitoring systems; facility and asset inspection and repair programs; spill management training; dedicated response employees; drills and exercises; operations-specific response plans; and contracted land and water remediation resources. As applicable, these measures are periodically assessed, benchmarked, and updated for best practices.

Beginning in 2024, the company identified “Oil Release to Waterway” as an Enterprise Risk, enhancing organizational focus on strategically mitigating the risk. In establishing “Oil Release to Waterway” as an Enterprise Risk, CECONY has created greater accountability for mitigation of this risk, with programmatic reporting to the Board of Directors.

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