Cleco Launches Historic Grid Resiliency Push Across Louisiana
Cleco has kicked off the largest grid resiliency investment ever seen in the company’s history, putting urgent infrastructure upgrades into motion to slash power outages and speed up restoration times for nearly 300,000 customers across Louisiana.
The five-year plan encompasses more than 550 projects targeting critical upgrades such as replacing outdated electric equipment, undergrounding vulnerable lines, reinforcing utility poles, and elevating substations above flood-prone areas. This major modernization drive is designed to harden the electrical grid against storms and other disruptions that often leave communities powerless for days.
Wide-Ranging Effort To Fortify Power Reliability
So far, Cleco teams have assessed over 700 utility poles across key locations including Covington, Eunice, Jeanerette, Lacombe, Madisonville, New Iberia, Pineville, and Slidell for maintenance or replacement. These upgrades target both residential customers and critical service providers such as hospitals and emergency responders.
Andre Guillory, Cleco Chief Customer Officer, said:
“Our resiliency efforts benefit residential customers and a portion of the projects will focus on critical customers, like hospitals and emergency services, whose work is essential during times of crisis.”
Danny Rider, director of distribution reliability and resiliency at Cleco, emphasized the broad benefits of these efforts:
“These projects will further strengthen systemwide resilience, reduce storm-related costs and result in fewer outages and faster restoration times for our customers.”
Proven Record Sets High Expectations
Cleco has an impressive record of dependability, consistently keeping customer power on more than 99.9% of the time and meeting Louisiana Public Service Commission standards for 27 consecutive years. With the new investments, the company aims to build on that legacy and better protect its customers from increasingly severe weather events and infrastructure vulnerabilities.
Cleco Corporate Holdings LLC operates through Cleco Power LLC, managing eight generating units with a combined rated capacity of 2,676 megawatts. Its retail power service reaches approximately 298,000 Louisiana customers, with additional wholesale power supplied statewide.
Why Kentucky and U.S. Customers Should Watch This
This massive resiliency initiative in Louisiana signals a broader trend impacting utility companies across the United States, including Kentucky, where aging infrastructure and extreme weather increasingly threaten power reliability. Investments like Cleco’s reflect the urgent need to modernize the grid nationally to protect homes, hospitals, and businesses from costly blackouts and prolonged outages.
Kentucky residents and policymakers can monitor similar efforts as regional utilities push large-scale projects to improve grid durability and respond faster when disasters strike. With energy security becoming a critical priority, Cleco’s aggressive multi-year program sets a benchmark for what proactive grid modernization can achieve.
What’s Next
Cleco’s grid overhaul is ongoing, with many of the 550-plus projects actively underway across Louisiana communities. The company plans continued updates as milestones are reached and as improvements directly impact customer experience with fewer interruptions and faster restoration times.
For Kentucky and US audiences, this evolving story highlights the urgent need for investment in resilient infrastructure nationwide — a subject that will shape energy availability and economic stability in the coming years.
Stay tuned to Kentucky Insider for the latest updates on power grid resiliency initiatives impacting the region and the nation.
