A national electricity council promised Wednesday to do more to make sure utilities obey rules designed to prevent blackouts like the one that cut power to 50 million people last year.

Investigators have discovered that utilities ignored several voluntary safeguards in the months before the blackout hit the Northeast last August.

The North American Electric Reliability Council - whose members include companies that transfer power from generators to customers - agreed Wednesday to collect and review all reported violations.

Power companies must report any violations within a month, and the council will set a deadline for correcting the problem.

"NERC will take all necessary steps to obtain full compliance with its reliability rules," chairman Richard Druin said.

The council sets voluntary standards for its members, and there are no penalties for failing to follow them. The council has been pressing Congress to force power companies to accept its standards and to give the group the ability to enforce those rules.

Last week, the council reported that its system of finding and correcting the faults of power companies was inadequate before the blackout. A complete report is due in March.

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