Consumers Energy Completes nearly 2,700 Low Voltage and High Voltage Distribution Reliability Projects Across Michigan in 2025

Consumers Energy crews completed major grid improvement projects across Michigan in 2025 to strengthen the electric system, reduce outages, restore power faster and help control costs for customers.

The upgrades reflect the company’s commitment to invest customers' money in improving their experience during severe weather statewide. 80% of customer rate increased over the past 5 years fund reliability improvements.

In 2025, Michigan experienced historic ice storms, extreme winds and one of the most active tornado seasons since 1950. Consumers Energy reinforced equipment, trimmed trees near power lines, inspected infrastructure and installed technology to spot problems earlier.

Despite 20 percent more weather driven outage events, Consumers Energy's investments reduced customer impacts by 130,000 outages at their homes and businesses. Improved storm forecasting and planning generated $15 million in savings, helping crews respond efficiently and reducing costs over time.

In 2025, Consumers Energy completed nearly 2,700 low voltage and high voltage distribution reliability projects, including:

• Built three new substations and completed seven fractionalization projects to divide the electric grid into smaller sections and support growing communities
• 32,173 utility poles installed to replace and upgrade infrastructure
• 26,069 miles of power lines inspected by crews, helicopters and drones and over 12,000-line sensors installed to catch issues early
• Trees and limbs cleared from more than 8,000 miles of power lines to prevent outages caused by falling branches, reduce storm damage and improve safety
• Used automated technology to reroute power during outages by creating 31 ATR loops including 96 reclosers to limit customer impact and outage length.

Consumers Energy is focused on projects supporting the long-term goals of the Reliability Roadmap, which are that no customer is without power for more than 24 hours and no single weather incident affects more than 100,000 customers.

"We know customers are feeling the impact of rising costs on everything from groceries to housing and insurance," said Chris Fultz, vice president of low voltage distribution. "That is why we are focused on smart, preventative work that strengthens the grid because avoiding outages and restoring power faster helps reduce customers' costs over time."