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Hydro One Restores power to 70,000 customers

March 3, 2007 - Hydro One confirms that it has now restored power to 70,000 customers affected by the winter storm that impacted the Bruce Peninsula and southwestern and eastern Ontario on Friday. Approximately 10,000 Hydro One customers were without power as of Saturday morning.

The storm system that made its way across parts of the province brought a combination of snow, freezing rain, high and gusting winds and resulted in more than 400 downed poles, wires, and trees and saw approximately 80,000 Hydro One customers lose power at the storm's peak.

Approximately 700 Hydro One's highly mobile field staff have been deployed to complete the restoration effort since the onset of the storm. While the company anticipates this focused effort will see the vast majority of customers’ power restored by the end of weekend, it is expected that the nature and extent of storm damage in the Clinton and Walkerton areas could remain without power until early next week.

“While we have made significant progress in the first 24 hours since the storm, we are now getting into the slowest and most difficult part of our restoration effort," said Myles D'Arcey, Senior Vice President, Customer Operations, Hydro One. “We have deployed a small army of people to work in some pretty challenging terrain and hard to reach places along the shores of Lake Huron to bring our remaining customers back online.”

Reducing Power Useage Can Help
Following a significant power outage, customers can help ensure that power is fully and reliably restored more quickly by reducing their power consumption. Conserving energy can help the overall restoration effort by reducing pressure on the system.

Important Safety Information for Customers
Hydro One strongly advises customers to continue to take extra precaution should they discover fallen power lines on their properties. Even if a fallen wire is not sparking, it may still be energized and dangerous. People are urged to report to Hydro One the location of the fallen wires as soon as possible.

Restoring Power to Customers with Customer-Owned Equipment
Hydro One advises customers that their privately-owned electrical equipment may have sustained damage in this week's storm. If you know that your customer-owned equipment is damaged, you will need to hire a qualified electrical contractor to undertake necessary repair work who will then arrange for the required ESA inspection and Hydro One reconnection to restore your power.

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For more information and to make arrangements for photography, contact Hydro One Media Relations 24 hours a day at 1-877-506-7584 (toll-free in Ontario only) or 416-345-6868. Our website is www.HydroOne.com.

For the most recent information on power outages go to: www.HydroOneNetworks.com.

Hydro One owns and operates Ontario's 28,400 kilometer high-voltage transmission network that delivers electricity to large industrial customers and municipal utilities, and a 122,000 kilometre low-voltage distribution system that serves about 1.3 million end-use customers and smaller municipal utilities in the province. Hydro One is wholly owned by the Province of Ontario.