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Bangor Hydro Electric Company (Bangor Hydro) is an electric utility wholly owned by Emera Inc.. It serves a population of 192,000 in a 5,275 square mile area in eastern and east coastal Maine. Bangor Hydro is a member of New England Power Pool and is interconnected with the New England Utilities to the south and with the New Brunswick Power Corp. to the north.Bangor Hydro-Electric Company is a subsidiary of BHE Holdings, Inc.

History
Bangor Hydro Electric Company officially became Bangor Hydro in 1925, although its history was in the making long before that. On January 1, 1900, Bangor Railway and Electric Company, a predecessor company of Bangor Hydro, utilized the first hydro-electric station in Maine, located in Veazie, to operate 30 miles of electric railway, about 10 thousand incandescent electric lamps and nearly 100 metric horsepower of small electric motors in greater Bangor area.

On March 1, 1925, Bangor Hydro Electric Company incorporated with the consolidation of several small electric companies in eastern Maine. This allowed Bangor Hydro to serve 20,000 customers in central and eastern Maine. On July 1, 1964, Bangor Hydro completed construction of its oil-fired station called Graham Station in Veazie. This is the last generating station solely constructed by Bangor Hydro.

On September 25, 1998, Bangor Hydro signed an agreement to sell its power plants as required by the State electric industry restructuring law. Beginning March 1,2000, Bangor Hydro was no longer allowed to generate electricity but to remain responsible for the delivery aspects of electricity service.

On October 10, 2001, Emera completed its $205 million purchase of Bangor Hydro, becoming the first Canadian company to purchase an American utility. All of the common shares were bought for $26.806 U.S. per share in cash.

In 2010, BHE Holding, the parent company of Bangor Hydro and a subsidiary of Emera, bought Maine Public Service which is also a utility company operating in Maine. BHE Holdings bought Maine & Maritimes Corp., parent company of Maine Public Service, in a deal valued at approximately $108 million, $45 per share in cash. As part of the proposal, BHE Holdings assumed $31 million in debt owed by Maine & Maritimes and resulted in a merger between the two utility companies, Maine Public Service and Bangor Hydro.

Smart Grid Upgrade
In 2009, Bangor Hydro applied for a federal stimulus dollars to help fund its proposed $8.8 million Smart Grid project. It requested $4.3 million in grant funding for the project, which would be used in its energy conservation and in reducing customer bills. Although this federal stimulus was not awarded to Bangor Hydro, Maine Public Utilities Commission approved an investment of around $8 million in it's Smart Grid infrastructure development.

In 2011, Emera implemented power line communication-based "smart meters" replacing the regular meters, affecting 107,000 subscribers (192,000 people) in Bangor Hydro service area, having ruled out the wireless meter option in favor of gaining experience with powerline systems. ''These were seen as a major gateway into homes by Qualcomm Atheros, Apple, Verizon and others. Verizon in particular had strengthened its relationships with power utilities and began offering home monitoring  while it slowed down deployment of FTTH, possibly in favor of a future P1901 solution along the lines of Qualcomm Atheros' Hy-Fi offerings.''

Electric Vehicles
Under it's "Power Smart Maine" project, Bangor Hydro tries to encourage the use of electric vehicles. Among all the electric vehicles Bangor Hydro encourages the use of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV). As of July 2012, Bangor Hydro had 2 Chevy Volt,also a PHEV, in it's vehicle fleet for advertisement and monitoring of the car's performance and electricity consumption.

Heat Pumps
Bangor Hydro provides rebates on heat pumps to encourage use of alternative energy as a source of heat. This program started on September 24, 2009. Rebates offered by Bangor Hydro to customers willing to buy these heat pumps are $400 per ton for geothermal heat pump and advanced air source heat pumps, and $100 per ton for mini-split ductless heat pumps.

Completed Projects
Starting 2006, 5 five major projects completed by Bangor Hydro are listed below.

Northeast Reliability Interconnect (2006)
A 85-mile, 345 kilovolt transmission line from Orrington to the Canadian border was established that interconnected with a similar line in New Brunswick.

Hancock County Reliability Project (2008)
A 14-mile, 115 kilovolt transmission line from Ellsworth to Trenton was established to create higher capacity connection to the lower Hancock region in Maine.

Keene Road 345 kV Substation (2010)
A 345 kilo-volt substation was built to establish stronger feed to the Northern division of Bangor Hydro to serve existing customers and support future load growth.

Line 64 Rerate (2011)
A 44-mile long, 40-year-old 115 kilo-volt transmission that feed Bangor Hydro's northern operating regions was reconstructed. This line stretches from Veazie to Chester, Maine.

MDI Reliability Project
The MDI Reliability Project is a combination of local transmission and distribution upgrades to improve service to multiple coastal island communities in Maine. The combined load capacity of transmission to these areas is to be increased to approximately 30MW. The key objectives of this project are to establish two redundant feeds onto MDI to provide a back-up in case the current line is out of service. These upgrades are designed to establish an on-island network to meet reliability and capacity needs of Bangor Hydro customers until 2030.

Orrington / MPRP Upgrade Project
The Orrington / MPRP Upgrade Project is comprised of three physical upgrades required to accommodate Central Maine Power's (CMP) Maine Power Reliability (MPRP) Project. Two additional structures are needed to accept a 345 kV line and a 115 kV line. These two new line terminations are part of the MPRP project. Once constructed, Bangor Hydro has an agreement with Central Maine Power to own and operate the line facilities in it's service territory.

Downeast Reliability Project
The goal of the Downeast Reliability Project is to establish a new 43 mile long, 115kV transmission line extending from Ellsworth to Harrington/Columbia with a new substation in Sullivan and switching stations in Ellsworth and Columbia. Bangor Hydro aims to establish this new line as a backup,in case of a failure in the primary line serving parts of Hancock and Washington counties of Maine. This project enables reconstruction of an aging Bangor Hydro transmission line and allows connection of any potential renewable electrical generation.The project is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2012.

Northeast Energy Link (NEL)
Goal of Northeast Energy Link (NEL) is to construct two 660 MW DC cable circuits 250 miles long, with DC converter stations to transmit significant renewable energy into the New England grid. It aims to lower supply costs in the New England market and attract renewable generation. Bangor Hydro plans this project to provide a corridor for transmission for renewable energy sources from Maine and Canada.

PowerSmart Maine
Electric vehicles, heat pumps and any other project related to renewable energy and smart grid in Bangor Hydro falls under this larger PowerSmart Maine project.Under this project Bangor Hydro has also attempted to give online access to real time electricity usage to customers. This would allow budgeting and management of electricity and appliance usage in households, and as per the privacy policy of the company, it would not be able to monitor individual appliances but the entire household usage.

Charitable Giving Program
Bangor Hydro is involved in charities and is the source of funds for many different non-profit organizations. It has a five-year commitment to The Jackson Laboratory totaling $100,000 and is listed under "ALS Therapy Alliance" in Jackson Lab's annual "Givings Club". In 2010, Bangor Hydro made a three-year, $30,000 charitable commitment to Big Brothers Big Sisters of Midcoast Maine, which is a non-profit organization that aims to support children. Bangor Hydro was recognized by the organization as the 3rd top business fundraiser for the year of 2011. Bangor Hydro has been one of the most successful fund raising corporations for United Way and in a particular year, has been able to finish with a record of up to $110,000 raised.

Other organizations that Bangor Hydro supports are Maine Coast Memorial Hospital, the Collins Center for the Arts at University of Maine, the Downeast Family YMCA and the Bangor Y. Non profit organizations looking to garner support for their projects or events may visit the company website, www.bangorhydro.com, and follow the links to "About Us", and "Charitable Giving". The company requires completion of an online form in considering requests for support. Paper inquires are not accepted.