CIN Cinergy Corp

Cinergy (NYSE:CIN) sent 200 employees and contract personnel to the New Orleans area to assist Entergy in the restoration of electric service after Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast area last week. Currently, the crews are restoring service in the Jefferson Parish area. The personnel are from Cincinnati Gas & Electric, Union Light Heat & Power and PSI Energy operating companies. It is anticipated that Cinergy will provide restoration assistance for six weeks. New personnel will be rotated in every two weeks. "When the crews arrived in the area, it was like a ghost town and unlike anything they had experienced in the past," said John Procario, senior vice president and chief operating officer of Cinergy's regulated business unit. "The area is under a curfew and only just recently are residents allowed in to collect what can be salvaged." Entergy's request is different from any received by the company in the past. Due to the amount of destruction in the affected areas, Cinergy crews are required to be a "self-contained" workforce. The crews will transport their own tents, kitchen, fuel and restoration materials to the work area. At the request of Florida Power & Light, Cinergy initially sent crews to Florida to restore power in the central Miami area of Little Haiti and Little Havana. Since most of the electric service has been restored in the area, Cinergy crews were released and returned home Friday. Cinergy employees at home are also helping to support the relief efforts. The Cinergy Foundation, will match employee donations to the American Red Cross dollar-for-dollar up to $25,000 through September 15. Cinergy Corp. has a balanced, integrated portfolio consisting of two core businesses: regulated operations and commercial businesses. Cinergy's regulated public utilities in Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky serve 1.5 million electric customers and about 500,000 gas customers. In addition, its Indiana regulated company owns 7,000 megawatts of generation. Cinergy's competitive commercial businesses have 6,300 megawatts of generating capacity with a profitable balance of stable existing customer portfolios, new customer origination, marketing and trading, and industrial-site cogeneration. Cinergy's integrated businesses make it a Midwest leader in providing both low-cost generation and reliable electric and gas service.