Jersey Central Power & Light announced today it will invest $108 million through 2028 to strengthen the electric grid in rapidly growing Ocean County. The plan includes system upgrades designed to improve reliability, reduce outage times, and support the region’s rising energy demand.
According to U.S. Census estimates, Ocean County has added nearly 30,000 residents since 2020. Over the past year alone, businesses and developers have requested more than 50 megawatts of new service—enough to power roughly 50,000 homes.
“Ocean County is growing at a pace that traditional forecasting formulas can’t keep up with,” said Doug Mokoid, FirstEnergy’s President for New Jersey. “We’re taking a fresh approach to improving reliability now and meeting power demand for years to come.”
$21 Million in Upgrades This Year
JCP&L will complete $21 million in improvements in 2025, including the installation of two new transformers and upgrades to an existing one at a local substation. The added capacity will help serve new development and allow the company to restore power more quickly by rerouting customers during outages.
In Lakewood, crews will replace more than three miles of line along South Hope Chapel Road, Brook Road, and Ocean Avenue with larger wire, and install additional underground cables in Leisure Village.
In Jackson, the company is upgrading wire along South Hope Chapel Road and Brewers Bridge Road and adding a new line near Six Flags Great Adventure. New automated devices will let JCP&L switch customers to other lines during an outage.
In Toms River, equipment north of Route 37 will be relocated to safer areas, and new automatic switching devices will improve reliability for customers in Leisure Village, Manchester, Lakehurst, and surrounding neighborhoods.
Further Work Planned Through 2028
From 2026 to 2028, JCP&L will invest another $29 million in Ocean County as part of its New Jersey Reliability Improvement Project. The work will include stronger poles and wires and additional protection and transfer devices in Lakehurst, Manchester, Berkeley, and Lacey.
An additional $58 million in upgrades will be carried out under EnergizeNJ, the company’s three-and-a-half-year modernization program approved by the state BPU in April 2025. Planned projects include new power lines to reduce outage impact, more than 200 TripSaver devices to automatically restore service after temporary faults, added automatic transfer equipment, and modernization of aging and coastal substation components.
So here we are… everything everyone kept saying. Development is approved too fast before addressing if infrastructure can handle it. It’s like we are working backwards. Traffic, roads and services need to be addressed during development approvals. Stop giving out variances and destroying our neighborhoods. It’s starting too look like a ghetto with lawn parking, no upkeep of properties, and litter everywhere and many electric outages. Stop the madness!! Stop believing your community is on your side — only interested in how much the developer can profit while you suffer. These upgrades will cost each and every one of us. It’s not free upgrades. Only benefits the LLCs, developers and investors.
AI servers will have this for breakfast.