We reported net income of $96 million or $1.07 per share compared to net income of $81 million or $0.91 per share in the first quarter of last year.
In light of the strong quarter and positive outlook, we are reaffirming our 2021 earnings guidance of $2.55 to $2.70 per share, as well as our long-term earnings and dividend growth rates.
In February, we restored over 750,000 customer outages, as nearly half of our customers were without power, many of whom experienced multiple outages over a more -- more than 2.5-week period.
As of March 31, the cost of the February storm were $87 million, which Jim will discuss in detail.
Today versus a year ago, customers are experiencing about 16% less planned outages.
Average outage restoration times are about 7% faster and outage text notifications and digital payment options are making a difference in customer satisfaction.
Overall, year-over-year, customer count increased more than 1%, and load growth was up 1.2% on a weather-adjusted basis and 2.3% after accounting for the harsh winter conditions.
Residential usage was up 3% weather-adjusted, offsetting commercial declines of 5%.
Industrial usage grew an impressive 8%, powered by the strength of the tech and digital sectors.
Unemployment currently stands at 5.7% across our service territory.
And this quarter, we join the Amazon Climate Pledge in keeping with our commitment to reduce carbon by 80% by 2030 over 2010 levels and our aspirational goal of net zero by 2040.
This site aligns with the West Coast clean transit corridor initiative to electrify along the I-5 Corridor from the borders with British Columbia to Mexico.
Approximately 40% of Oregonians have had at least one vaccine shot and as of mid-April, K-12 public schools reopened for in-person education, either hybrid or full time.
As of March 2021, the unemployment rate in PGE's service territory was 5.7% compared to a 14% peak in April 2020.
As Maria said, we reported $1.07 per share compared to $0.91 per share in the first quarter of 2020.
First, we saw a $0.06 increase in total revenue.
This is composed of $0.04 due to higher loads, which increased 1.2% year-over-year weather-adjusted and a $0.02 positive impact from weather.
Additionally, there was $0.02 from the earnings power associated with the Wheatridge Renewable Energy Facility, which was placed in service in the fourth quarter of 2020.
Next, a $0.03 decrease in net variable power costs driven by lower hydro wind production in 2021.
A $0.07 decrease was associated with higher operating and maintenance administrative expense, which consists of $0.05 of favorable fixed plant O&M primarily due to lower maintenance expense at our generation facilities.
This was offset by $0.12 of unfavorable administrative expenses, which included $0.03 of higher employee benefit expenses, $0.03 of higher legal and professional expense and $0.03 from the timing of bad debt recognition under our COVID deferral, and $0.03 from other items.
A $0.05 increase was associated with lower depreciation and amortization expense, largely as a result of asset retirements, which were partially offset by capital addition.
There was a $0.04 increase in other income, primarily attributed to market returns on the non-qualified benefit trust.
It was an $0.11 increase from lower tax expense, primarily driven by a one-time recognition of a benefit from a local flow through tax.
Regarding the deferral related to our storm costs, detailed on Slide 6 through March 31, 2021, we've incurred an estimated $87 million in incremental cost due to the February storm, of which $33 million were capital expenditures and $54 million were operating expenditures associated with our transmission and distribution system.
We have a storm deferral mechanism that collects $4 million annually from retail customers to cover incremental expenses related to storm damages, and we defer any amount not utilized in the current year.
In response to the February storms, we exhausted our storm collection balance for 2021 of $9 million to offset operating expenses.
This brings the cumulative incurred cost from the February storm to be estimated at $45 million net as of March 31, 2021.
Turning to Slide 7, which shows our updated capital forecast through 2025, we've increased our 2021 capital expenditures by $45 million this year, the majority of which relates to the capital expenditures from the recent storm restoration.
Given our guidance today, we raised our O&M guidance by $20 million.
$12 million of this increase is associated with the February storm response expense, which is ultimately offsetting revenue and the remaining $8 million is associated with additional initiatives to address wildfire risk, improve our outage restoration estimation and outage response processes.
We expect to fund 2021 capital expenditures and long-term debt maturities with cash from operations during 2021, which is expected to range from $600 million to $650 million.
We've also increased a long-term debt issuance later this year up to $350 million, which will refinance the short-term notes closed earlier this year and satisfy our 2022 requirements.
Total liquidity of $780 million, all of which is available.
Earlier this week, our Board approved a dividend increase of $0.09 per share on an annualized basis, which represents a 5.5% increase.
This increase is consistent with our long-term dividend growth guidance of 5% to 7%, while observing a dividend payout ratio of 60% to 70%.
We are on track to achieve our guided range and finished within the long-term growth guidance of 46% from the 2019 base year.

Summary:
We reported net income of $96 million or $1.07 per share compared to net income of $81 million or $0.91 per share in the first quarter of last year.
In light of the strong quarter and positive outlook, we are reaffirming our 2021 earnings guidance of $2.55 to $2.70 per share, as well as our long-term earnings and dividend growth rates.
As Maria said, we reported $1.07 per share compared to $0.91 per share in the first quarter of 2020.