PUB hearings on DarkNL start in St. John's

The Public Utilities Board is starting phase one hearings in St. John's Monday into the widespread power outages in Newfoundland last winter that left thousands without power.

Liberty Consulting Group was commissioned by the PUB in early 2014 to review the January 2014 outages, also commonly known as 'DarkNL'.

In a report on Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro and Newfoundland Power released by the group in December, Liberty said there is still a high risk of further outages for 2015-2017.

The investigation into the system breakdowns and rolling outages is being investigated by the PUB in two phases.

Phase one will look at the adequacy and reliability of supply on the island's interconnected system until Muskrat Falls is brought online.

In the second phase of hearings, the PUB will look at those same factors after Muskrat Falls is connected.

Monday's hearing will start at 10 a.m. March 30 at the Prince Charles Building on Torbay Road in St. John's.

Requests to make presentations to the board had to be filed before March 19. Written comments for phase one can be submitted to the board before April 7.