I’ve been working in the utility industry for 35 years, and most of the consultants I’ve worked with just don’t have the practical knowledge of the utility business. So I end up spending a lot of time upfront explaining our business. Not EPP. The consultants at EPP have all “been there, done that” when it comes to emergency planning and restoration services, and their expertise comes shining through.

EPP developed and conducted Incident Command Training, four tabletop exercises and a three-day functional exercise to prepare my company for a Corporate Storm Readiness Program summer session. Incident Command Training was conducted for all personnel with a designated role within the Incident Response Plans. Tabletop exercises were conducted regionally, with approximately 100 personnel participating in each. The functional exercise was conducted over the course of 3 days and included close to 30 company locations simultaneously. Opportunities for improvement were identified. EPP’s expertise is second-to-none!

We recently hired EPP to conduct an audit of the physical security of our company’s critical assets. This included an asset assessment, threat source analysis, identification of infrastructure inter-dependencies, assessment of operations security, and reviews of drill/test of emergency procedures, the response/restoration/rebuild capabilities for infrastructure damage, and security strategies and plans. This project involved a significant number of interviews and visits to corporate facilities, and the results truly exceeded all expectations.

We’ve been working with EPP for years, most recently on an operational audit of our emergency restoration processes after a large windstorm impacted 70% of our utility’s customers, and I can honestly say that our emergency preparedness processes are better now than they have ever been.

Eileen, Tom, Rich, Matt, the two Mikes, and the entire team at EPP are clearly experts in their field. We have used EPP twice for emergency planning purposes and their expertise is clear. The projects involved conducting a review of the business continuity plan and recommended corrective actions, developing 60 department-specific business continuity plans, and providing input regarding the quality and content of the plans. We’re not talking theory here; these guys deliver practical solutions that are perfectly suited for the real-world. Kudos to Eileen and her team!

I’ve been working with EPP for almost 10 years now, so when they asked me to give a testimonial I jumped at the chance. These guys are excellent. I can’t imagine how we could have climbed up the emergency planning learning curve without their help. Not only did EPP literally create our emergency plan from scratch, but they execute annual onsite emergency drills for us so that our employees are all on the same page. They have also provided expert testimony to the Public Utilities Commission covering our utility’s emergency response plan and restoration operations, which was derived from a full operational audit of a large-scale restoration event. I can’t recommend EPP enough!

Eileen and her team came in to develop and execute an emergency training regimen, and I have to say that they exceeded my expectations. No stone was left unturned. They developed an emergency operating plan with accompanying procedures, conducted a series of training events that covered the new plan as well as the Incident Command System (ICS), and developed and conducted a tabletop exercise that included over 80 participants from all areas of the company. Our employees now know exactly what to do when disaster strikes, and we certainly could not have done this without EPP!

EPP did exactly what they said they would – they acted like partners instead of consultants. It was refreshing to work with a group of people so dedicated to my company’s cause. As a major electric utility with a less-than-ideal emergency plan, we needed a company to really take the bull by the horns and deliver not only what we wanted, but also what we needed – and that is exactly what they did. This included the development of strategies to enhance the response organization, a review of the plan to provide recommended organizational structure improvements, and the identification of key functions missing from the plan. Definitely a fantastic and invaluable experience!

EPP did a great job of evaluating our current emergency response, restoration, and communications protocols and practices to determine the magnitude of financial, social and health related issues that were experienced due to loss of electricity caused by two recent storms. From this, they worked with us to come up with a list of emergency plan requirements perfectly suited to exactly what we needed. I highly recommend the EPP team!