BGE joins utilities across the country in celebration of the women and men whose work provides customers with the safe, reliable electric service they depend on to power so many essential parts of their personal and professional lives.
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Each year on July 10, National Lineworker Appreciation Day salutes those responsible for maintaining and improving the electric system—overhead, underground, at substations, and everywhere else the grid extends. These employees brave harsh seasonal conditions as a routine part of their job in the field, and they respond at any hour of the day when emerging issues with complex electrified equipment require their expert technical skills.
BGE lineworkers ensure service reliability for more than 1.3 million customers in central Maryland. These crews are responsible for nearly 9,200 miles of overhead primary electric distribution and 17,917 miles of underground primary distribution, along with 1,540 feeders and 313 substations. They also maintain over 290,000 streetlights that illuminate roadways in the Baltimore area.
The company’s lineworkers manage this massive electric system while improving service for customers overall. Since 2011, their work has been integral to decreasing the number of electric outages for BGE customers by 40 percent and reducing outage length by 36 percent (50 minutes).
Nearly 121,000 lineworkers are employed by U.S. utilities, which celebrate National Lineworker Appreciation Day together with BGE, the Edison Electric Institute, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), and BGE’s sister Exelon utilities Atlantic City Electric, ComEd, Delmarva Power, PECO, and Pepco. The annual appreciation day honors the life and work of Henry Miller, the first president of IBEW.
Here’s a look at a day in the life of BGE’s lineworkers.