Press Release

NEW YORK, Aug. 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Con Edison said today that the recent heat wave resulted in a number of power-use records for the utility. July saw a new high for monthly electricity sendout -- the cumulative amount of energy used by customers -- of 6,395,843 megawatt hours, surpassing the previous mark of 6,192,161 megawatt hours set in July, 2002. This level of monthly power consumption for New York City and Westchester County is more than the amount of electricity used in Vermont or Alaska over an entire year.

In addition, on July 27 at 5:00 p.m., Con Edison registered a new summertime hourly gas usage record of 55,690 dekatherms. The new usage mark surpassed the former summer record of 54,586 dekatherms, which was set July 26, 2005 at 6:00 p.m. This record-setting level of usage was due predominantly to an increased need for natural gas to generate electricity in the city's power plants.

With the mercury hitting 100 degrees in some parts of Con Edison's service area last week, on Tuesday and Wednesday, July 26 and 27, the company also saw new single-day power consumption records of 251,700 and 260,095 megawatt hours, respectively. This marks the most and second-most amount of electricity ever used in the company's service area in one day. Five of the company's top 10 days for most power use have come this summer.

In July, Con Edison also registered the three highest days of peak demand in the company's 123-year history of delivering electricity, culminating in the 13,059 megawatts reached on July 27 at 5:00 p.m. Peak electricity demand is the greatest amount of energy being supplied at a given time.

The Con Edison system delivers electricity across a network of 92,000 miles of underground and nearly 33,000 miles of overhead wires, and sends natural gas through almost 4,300 miles of mains and nearly 400,000 service pipes to serve approximately 9 million New York City and Westchester County residents.

Con Edison is a subsidiary of Consolidated Edison, Inc. (NYSE: ED), one of the nation's largest investor-owned energy companies, with approximately $10 billion in annual revenues and $24 billion in assets. The utility provides electric, gas and steam service to more than 3 million customers in New York City and Westchester County, New York. For additional financial, operations and customer service information, visit Con Edison's Web site at http://www.coned.com .

SOURCE Con Edison -0- 08/01/2005 /CONTACT: Michael Clendenin of Con Edison, +1-212-460-4111/ /Web site: http://www.coned.com/ (ED)