The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission plans to close up shop Thursday as a precaution while Hurricane Isabel threatens to plow through the Virginia, Maryland and Washington, DC region. Congress also plans to scale back its activities.

FERC said it will close its main headquarter offices in Washington at 2 p.m. EDT, and will begin a phased shutdown of its online systems, including the electronic filing and eLibrary systems, and its e-mail system at noon. All systems will be returned to service as soon as possible after the storm passes and the agency can safely restart the servers, it noted.

“If you are relying on the electronic filing system to make a submission that is due on Sept. 18 or Sept. 19, and you are unable to file because of the eFiling system outage, the secretary will consider a brief motion to accept the filing as timely if you include the motion when you can submit the filing,” FERC said in a press statement.

In the event of an extended power outage, FERC said its backup power system can only keep its web site server up for a few hours. Information on building access and system availability will be posted on the agency’s web site at www.ferc.gov.

On Capitol Hill, both House and Senate lawmakers have left early and are not expected to return until Tuesday. The staffs of some of the lawmakers, however, said they plan to be in their offices.

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