empower Delivered By Craighead Electric – Craighead Electric Cooperative, Inc.

Over the past 82 years, Craighead Electric Cooperative Corporation (CECC) invested millions of dollars to build a robust electric system that continues to provide safe, reliable and affordable electric power to its members.

But times are changing and with that change brings a whole new opportunity to modernize our grid with a communications network that will link critical electric assets together to ensure power quality, reliability, and increase CECC operational efficiency.

As a byproduct of that smart grid communications upgrade project, the CECC Board of Directors recently approved Craighead Electric to provide a new service: High-speed broadband internet! empower, Delivered by Craighead Electric, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of CECC that will offer lightning-fast internet, crystal-clear phone, and ultra-HD live streaming TV throughout the CECC service territory.

Over the next 5-7 years, roughly 5,000 miles of fiber optic cable will be built in support of this communications upgrade project. This brand-new network will be able to handle more than 30,000 1 Gbps connections for members and non-members of CECC throughout northeast Arkansas. This important and necessary enhancement to CECC’s electrical system not only means that members will benefit from improved electrical power delivery but it will also bring truly reliable and high-speed broadband to the more than 44% of CECC members who are currently unserved or underserved in terms of broadband in our eight-county region!