By Douglas Johnson, BPA Senior Spokesperson
In mid-October Clallam PUD General Manager Sean Worthington and other PUD leaders joined a group of Bonneville Power Administration executives and staff, including Chief Operating Officer Joel Cook, Senior Vice President for Transmission Services Richard Shaheen and Vice President of Transmission Field Services John Lahti toured portions of the Port-Angeles-Sappho #1 transmission corridor. The visit allowed participants to view first-hand infrastructure and vegetation management actions designed to improve the level of service provided to Clallam PUD customers by the line.
The group also gained valuable perspectives about remaining challenges the line faces during inclement weather, which historically has caused the line to provide a lower quality of service than BPA would like. They also saw the rugged terrain around the line that sometimes makes it harder for BPA crews to find and repair damage prolonging outages, which is a major inconvenience and potentially dangerous situation for area residents.
BPA wants Clallam PUD customers to know that we continue to take measures to maintain and improve the line’s performance.
For instance, this summer Olympia and Chehalis Transmission Line Maintenance crews completed a change out of 15 structures, totaling 30 poles, on the Port Angeles-Sappho transmission line.
It is important to note that teams were able to perform most of this work safely while keeping the line energized and not disturbing power to the approximately 6,500 Clallam PUD customers served by the line. Work requiring outages to the line was carefully coordinated in advance with Clallam PUD and conducted overnight to minimize impacts to customers. This coordination allowed Clallam PUD to reach out to customers with lots of advance notice to prepare for the lack of power.
In addition to replacing the structures, the team installed a new fire-retardant wrap designed to add fire protection to the new structures. This protection measure wraps around the bottom of the wood poles, and when exposed to extreme heat, provides excellent flame resistance. They can also withstand years of outdoor weathering.
BPA crews were also busy this year managing the trees and brush along the line corridor. Crews cut and scattered trees and vegetation along 241 acres (mostly in the corridor, under the line). Crews also applied safe, non-toxic herbicides to 346 acres of brush and other vegetation under the line to prevent resprouting and regrowth of plants and trees already cut. In addition, BPA side-limbed 248 trees along the transmission corridor and removed 20 danger trees, which are trees that are in bad health and more likely to fall into the line taking it out of service.
This year, BPA will begin to take a closer look at engineering solutions it could deploy to improve the quality of service and reduce outages and their duration. We want Clallam PUD customers served by the line to know we are committed to improving reliability and reducing the number and duration of outages customers that rely on this line experience.