More than 2.6 million electricity customers in Florida were without power Sept. 29 after Hurricane Ian battered the state, causing widespread outages.

By about 11 a.m. ET on Sept. 29, the center of Ian, since downgraded to a tropical storm as winds weakened, emerged into the western Atlantic north of Cape Canaveral, Fla. The storm tracked farther east than initially forecast and moved back over water faster than expected, but meteorologists still expect it to turn northward in coming days, and conditions could lead it to strengthen again, according to the National Hurricane Center.

More than 2.6 million customers were without power in Florida as of about 11 a.m. on Sept. 29. Nearly half were NextEra Energy Inc. utility Florida Power & Light Co. customers, at about 1.2 million, followed by more than 636,000 Duke Energy Corp. customers and nearly 280,000 Tampa Electric Co. customers.

FPL said in a Sept. 29 morning update that it had restored power to about half a million customers as Ian continued its destructive path through the state. FPL's restoration workforce grew to 20,000 with mutual assistance from 30 states, the utility said. FPL serves more than 5 million electric customers in Florida.

As the company assesses damage, FPL said it expects that some customers will face prolonged outages as parts of its electric grid in southwest Florida will need to be entirely rebuilt rather than repaired.

"We understand how difficult it is to be without power. ... That said, the catastrophic nature of this storm means that we may need to rebuild parts of our system in southwest Florida, which will take time," FPL Chairman and CEO Eric Silagy said in a statement Sept. 29.

"There's 1.5 million outages in seven southwest Florida counties," Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said in a Sept. 29 morning briefing, echoing that the areas hardest hit will require rebuilds. "Lee and Charlotte [counties] are basically off the grid at this point. ... That's going to be more than just connecting a power line back to a pole."

Following an investor presentation, NextEra Energy Chairman, President and CEO John Ketchum said the investments the Juno Beach, Fla.-headquartered utility has made to strengthen its infrastructure to prepare for storms "have held up well."

"Where we have some risk obviously is where you have a lot of that water intrusion with that 12- to 18-foot swells coming [onshore]," Ketchum said Sept. 29 during a virtual presentation at the Wolfe Research Utilities, Midstream & Clean Energy Conference.

"The generation assets are in good shape," Ketchum added, noting that the question is how well the company's distribution network has held up, especially given the flooding associated with Ian.

"We have the right level of resources to deal with [restoring and rebuilding infrastructure] and I think to deal with it successfully like you've seen us to do in the past, but we'll have a full assessment by the end of the day," the CEO said.

The Florida Public Service Commission "has never denied" any of NextEra's efforts to recover storm restoration costs, Ketchum said. "The state knows what we're up against."

Duke Energy Florida LLC State President Melissa Seixas said recovery efforts were hampered by flooding and equipment damage in the state. Ahead of the storm's arrival, Duke said it had mobilized nearly 10,000 line workers, tree professionals, and damage assessment and support personnel in Florida.

Ian first struck Florida as a Category 4 storm with 150-mph winds, torrential rains and a wall of storm surge, one of the strongest storms to come ashore in the state's history. While Ian's winds weakened after it arrived on land, forecasters expect the storm to regain hurricane-level wind strength by the evening of Sept. 29 and maintain that intensity as it approaches the Carolinas and makes another potential landfall along the South Carolina coast, according to the National Hurricane Center. Ian is forecast to have an atypical structure as it travels over the Southeast U.S., with strong winds extending well ahead of its center.

The governors of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia all preemptively declared states of emergency ahead of the storm.

More than 30,000 MW of nuclear capacity, including plants in Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia, are potentially in the storm's path, beyond the 26 plants with an operating capacity of at least 1,000 MW in Florida, according to an S&P Global Market Intelligence analysis.

The storm previously struck Cuba as a Category 3 hurricane, taking down the country's electric grid. In Puerto Rico, more than 223,000 electricity customers remained without power Sept. 29 in the aftermath of Hurricane Fiona, according to Poweroutage.us. In the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, 116,000 electricity customers remained without power Sept. 29 also due to Fiona, according to the Poweroutage website.

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