Employee Health & Safety

Safety is built into every decision that we make. Our Safety Management System is built upon a strong culture with safety at its core. A robust foundation of industry-relevant policies, procedures and standards sets high expectations for our employee and contractor workforce that are continually monitored through a network of systems, programs and initiatives to measure performance and facilitate continuous improvement.

Key highlights from Con Edison’s Safety Management System include:

• A robust library of Corporate Environmental, Health & Safety Procedures (CEHSPs) that establishes the playbook to working safely and maintaining compliance with regulatory standards
• Accompanying General Environmental, Health & Safety Instructions (GEHSIs) that distill regulatory jargon into plain language, making compliance requirements more accessible to the general workforce
• A comprehensive Environmental Health & Safety Training Program for new hires, veteran employees and contractors that covers a wide variety of subjects ranging from topics mandated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to safety-related soft skills and leadership programs such as “Promoting A Safety Conscious Mindset at Work”
• A Safety & Health Information Management System (SHIMS) that serves as the Corporate system of record for all health and safety-related incidents, including injuries, illnesses, near misses, etc., and provides insightful data for trending and analysis
• A Safety Leadership System (SLS) that provides a 360 organizational safety performance overview with comprehensive metrics beyond the OSHA Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) that identifies granular areas of focus to strengthen safety culture and encourage vertical safety engagement across the organization
• Con Edison’s Time Out Program, a pioneering initiative that empowers all company employees and contractors with the ability to stop a job to review and resolve potential safety-related concerns prior to commencing with work
• A Close Call Program that proactively provides a means for employees and contractors to openly communicate EH&S concerns without the fear of disciplinary action, which saw a 10% increase in submissions from 2022 into 2023
• Speak Up Resources that promotes and supports a psychologically safe work environment where employees can express concerns without fear of retaliation

At Con Edison, we recognize that leading the transformation to zero-harm for our people, community, and planet requires commitment from us all. We continue to drive our workforce’s engagement in building and sustaining a mature, forward-looking safety culture. We listen to feedback from all stakeholders and strive to maintain a psychologically-safe environment that encourages frank self-assessment, unfiltered communication, and prompt corrective action when warranted. To this end, in 2023 we developed a new Safety Affirmation Statement, intended to focus on and serve as a personalized reminder of why we work safely, both individually and collectively:

“We care enough to do our very best to protect and preserve the health and safety of ourselves, our coworkers, and the diverse communities we serve so that we may all safely return to what really matters – our families, friends and loved ones – each and every day as we build the workforce of tomorrow.”

By the Numbers

The people of Con Edison know that safety is about much more than the numbers. Safety is about us, our people, first and foremost, always. However, we also understand that what gets measured gets done, and we’re passionate about continually improving safety performance in all areas. Thanks to the hard work and dedication of our workforce, in 2023, CECONY achieved an injury and illness rate of 1.00, which represents one of the best TRIRs in company history and met our target for the year. Overall, recordable injuries at CECONY have reduced by 74% since 2009. This improvement can be attributed to our many programs, initiatives and best practices, which are thoughtfully designed, implemented and periodically revisited to help us remain focused in the rights areas. One notable highlight includes our sustained emphasis on daily and routine stretching and ergonomic programs that helped us realize a 33% reduction of ergonomic-related injuries since program implementation in 2021. Even as the overall number of injuries has been trending lower, CECONY did experience three significant high-hazard injuries in 2023, up from one in 2022. The persistence of high-hazard injuries highlights the need to continually evolve Con Edison’s Safety Management System, and precipitated key efforts initiated in 2023 to focus on high energy hazard recognition, mitigation and control that will continue into 2024 and beyond.

In 2023, we pivoted towards a short- and long-term safety strategy that incorporates elements of energy based safety to identify sources of high-hazard energy on job sites and the capacity to “fail safely.” We also expanded alignment with the Edison Electric Institute’s (EEI) Safety Classification and Learning Model to enhance injury and illness case reviews and grow our understanding and knowledge of Serious Injury & Fatality (SIF) criteria to direct learnings aimed at preventing high hazard injuries. O&R continued to work towards zero harm for our employees with an injury rate of 1.24, one significant high-hazard injury and a 78% reduction in injuries and illnesses since 2009. At O&R, there were 15 recordable injuries and illnesses, which was the fifth lowest number in its history. In 2023 CECONY expanded the Safety Leadership System (SLS), a dynamic platform designed to improve safety performance, to all major organizations in the Company. The system collects and analyzes leading and lagging safety indicators with the goal of establishing a safety performance rate metric that provides a more comprehensive view of organizational and individual safety performance. Data shows that the system is working by increasing engagement with our safety programs in all areas.

In addition to many of the previously mentioned programs, O&R continues its progress toward a zero-harm workplace thanks to the joint union-management Corporate Safety Committee, Company Safety Team, and 12 organization-specific safety teams. In 2023, these teams collaborated to develop a customized significant high-hazard injury prevention program. The diversity of these teams strengthens our efforts and support from our employees. Additionally, our daily warm-up program continues to demonstrate success; we have decreased our soft tissue injuries by 83% and our days lost due to soft tissue injuries by 34% since the inception of the program. Our communications program has been lauded by our users for its quality and timeliness. Our communications program incorporates lessons learned from our industry and peers, root cause analysis results (from injury and collision reviews), close call reporting, and other measures that have also boosted our overall performance.

Since 2009, injuries have reduced by 74% at CECONY.

Driving down the injury/illness rate isn’t the only area where progress was made. CECONY successfully met several other safety-related Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in 2023 including:

• Public safety – related equipment failures (86 actual vs 170 Target)
• System safety – operating errors (43 actual vs 44 Target)
• Motor vehicle collisions (265 actual vs 280 Target)
• Contractor OSHA incidence rate* (0.84 actual vs 1.00 Target)

Achieving these Safety KPIs results from our multidisciplinary approach and commitment to safety at all levels. Regardless of whether we are building a splice, investigating a leak, designing critical system specifications or ordering new equipment, we are thinking about and integrating safety into the way we work. Our operational focus on improving system reliability and safety is paying dividends in reducing equipment failures, just as procedural adherence and attention to detail helps to keep us aligned with key work practices thereby mitigating instances associated with operating errors. Driving in and around our service territory can be especially challenging at times, particularly in areas with dense population and congested traffic, which is typical for us. As new technology and our metropolitan culture continues to evolve, we continue to face new challenges on our journey to reduce motor vehicle collisions. Driver safety ride-a-longs, targeted training and driving simulators are just some examples of the tools we use to raise awareness, improve driving safety skills and contribute to the overall reduction of motor vehicle collisions in 2023.

Con Edison partners with an extensive network of contractors to achieve our goals and better serve our key stakeholders. These contractors are held to the same safety standards as are our own employees. Our contractor oversight program begins with a thorough prequalification process and includes engagement activities throughout the duration of their work activities. We routinely engage with our contractors at multiple levels beginning with our team of field inspectors who document performance using our Contractor Oversight System, up through our Contractor Compliance Committee that takes action to ensure our standards are being met. CECONY’s Construction organization also hosts Contractor Safety Seminars for our largest contractor partners to communicate key feedback and information regarding safety performance, trends, best practices, and lessons learned. Contractors working under CECONY’s Construction organization demonstrated their commitment to safety in 2023 and achieved the Contractor OSHA Incidence Rate target of <=1 with a collective year end actual rate of 0.84. CECONY is currently working on a new Safety Leadership System module for our contractors that will help compare safety performance, using both leading and lagging indicators in the near future.

Since 2009, injuries and illnesses have reduced by 78% at O&R.

Our response to EH&S challenges needs to be just as dynamic as the fast-paced, ever-evolving service territory in which we operate. Whether we’re responding to last summer’s Canadian wildfire smoke conditions or taking additional precautions to prevent lithium-ion battery-related fires that have recently plagued New York City, we quickly get up to speed and make the necessary adjustments to safely keep our operations going and protect our people. We’re proactive about emerging issues – for example, we are field-testing available technologies to mitigate heat illnesses associated with sustained higher temperatures due to climate change, and engaging with third-party professional organizations to better understand injury trends and best practices. Safety is a journey at Con Edison, and we’re committed to being in the forefront of progress for the sake of everyone whose lives we touch.

The Utilities’ cultivation of a zero-harm workplace drives their initiatives to instill a safety conscious mindset in all employees and reduce incidents. At CECONY, there were 157 recordable injuries and employee illnesses (138 injuries and 19 illnesses, respectively) in 2022, which was the third lowest number of injuries and illnesses in its history. At O&R, there were 15 recordable injuries and illnesses, which was the fifth lowest number in its history. The Utilities’ efforts have resulted in an estimated reduction of more than 6,000 injuries since 2009.

Con Edison of New York OSHA Incident Rate

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Orange and Rockland OSHA Incident Rate

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