Nantucket Faces a Potential Electricity Supply Crisis

You could run out of many things while living on an island. Some things you don't want to run out of while living on an island; food, water and electricity are among them.

There is plenty of food and water on Nantucket, but residents face a potential power shortage. Food and water can be shipped to Nantucket by boat or plane, but getting electricity to the island is not so simple.

Currently, two undersea cables provide electricity to Nantucket from Cape Cod. The first is a 28-mile, $27 million cable installed in 1996 by National Grid that connects the island to Harwich. The utility ran a $41 million undersea cable to Hyannis in 2006 to meet growing demand.

The Nantucket Current reported, "Nantucket will need a third extension cord to the mainland to keep the lights on – and it may become necessary much sooner than the town and its utility provider National Grid expected."

The paper reported, "The island's peak demand for electricity is growing at five times the Massachusetts statewide average, leading the town and National Grid to conclude a third undersea cable will be necessary by 2033, just eight years from now, a project that could cost more than $200 million."

It was first thought that a third cable would not be necessary until 2044.

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Nantucket town counsel Devan C. Braun has written a letter to the Massachusetts Grid Modernization Advisory Council outlining the town's plight.

Town and utility officials reportedly fear that a malfunction of one of the existing undersea cables could leave Nantucket in dire straits.