PECO has once again been recognized as a national leader for its work to drive economic growth and job creation across southeastern Pennsylvania, according to new rankings by Site Selection, an internationally circulated business publication covering corporate real estate and economic development.

Based on responses to an annual survey and research by Site Selection staff among utilities with active economic development departments, PECO has been named one of the Top U.S. Utilities in Economic Development.

Companies were evaluated based on a points system awarding points on a cumulative and per-capita basis for the number of corporate facility investment projects attracted in the utility’s service area and the capital investment and job creation numbers affiliated with those investments across all facility types (manufacturing and industrial, office, data center, R&D, etc.).

This is the 14th time that PECO has received this recognition — a testament to the company’s record reliability experienced by more than 1.7 million electric customers and 553,000 natural gas customers across the Greater Philadelphia region, including some of the largest companies in the country headquartered in the region. In 2023 alone, PECO helped secure 16 new commercial projects collectively set to add 4,448 jobs at its facilities and more than $10.1 billion in local investment.

This recognition was achieved as a result of the contributions of PECO’s Economic Development team and its ongoing collaboration with regional economic development organizations to raise the profile of the Greater Philadelphia region as a destination for new and expanding businesses.

“PECO is proud to support the Greater Philadelphia region beyond our day-to-day duty of keeping the lights on and natural gas flowing,” said Carolina DiGiorgio, PECO’s Vice President of Governmental and External Affairs. “We are continuously developing new partnerships, researching current market trends, and focusing on varying industries in our area so we can continue to provide the critical infrastructure businesses need to locate and expand in southeastern Pennsylvania.”

In this year’s rankings, Site Selection noted PECO’s novel ways to support prospective developers, allowing them to seamlessly interact with the company for a variety of requests to bring projects to completion. The company’s efforts to make use of underutilized land in underserved areas was also recognized, along with PECO’s continued infrastructure investments to support unprecedented power demand from data centers, electric vehicle charging, and others.

“PECO has always been prominent in our annual survey of utility economic development activity,” said Adam Bruns, Editor in Chief of Site Selection. “Supplemental to our rankings this year are responses from utility leaders across the nation about how they’re dealing with unprecedented power demand for big projects. The PECO team’s ‘Connecting Your Business’ program and large load process show that their answers to customers and community are just as robust as their answers to us.”

“When it comes to business attraction and expansion, having a reputable utility provider in your area is crucial,” said James Medaglio, Director of Business Attraction & Expansion at the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia. “PECO, and their amazing economic development team, are true regional partners that consistently and quickly collaborate with economic developers and private companies to make southeastern Pennsylvania a great place to do business.”

PECO is part of the Exelon Corporation, the nation’s largest utility company serving more than 10 million customers nationally. Recognition of the strength of the Exelon is attributed to the investments that are being made across the system — including northern Illinois and the mid-Atlantic — to ensure continued customer reliability in the face of extreme weather events and to prepare businesses and families for the clean energy transition.