Episode 2

 

Episode 2 Transcript:

Jim Anderson: 0:08

Welcome back to Power Factor, a podcast powered by Midstate Electric Cooperative. I'm your host, Jim Anderson, the CEO and General Manager. Today, we're diving into a topic that's at the top of everybody's mind with wildfire preparedness and what happens behind the scenes in Midstate. As wildfire season grows longer and longer and becomes more intense, electric utilities across the West are making tough decisions on how to keep the community safe. At Midstate, safety is one of the core things we do, from maintaining power to making high stakes calls during extreme weather events.

Jim Anderson: 0:39

Joining us today are two of the key leaders who help drive the decisions behind the scenes Our Operations Manager, Brian Sharr, and Engineering Manager, Tom Weller. They'll be answering some of the most common questions that we get from our members. Whether you're a longtime member or new to the service territory, this episode will give you a behind-the-scenes look at the proactive steps that we are taking to protect you, your family and the grid that we rely on. Let's get started. So, Brian, Tom, welcome, Thank you, Thank you. So we're going to start out today with some questions for both of you. We hear a lot about fire mitigation. Can you explain to the members what fire mitigation actually means in the utility world.

Brian Sharr: 1:20

Yeah, wildfire mitigation involves taking proactive steps to minimize risk, hardening of the grid, enhancing power line safety settings, and being proactive in vegetation management and strategic use of technology to control power flows, and also working across all public and private entities.

Tom Weller: 1:38

Yeah, we are trying to mitigate or lower the risk of starting a fire due to birds, squirrels, trees and vegetation getting into our lines and starting a fire. Also, we're building new lines that will survive a fire, if a fire should occur.

Jim Anderson: 1:53

That's good. So, from your standpoint, why is fire mitigation such a priority for a co-op like Midstate, and what makes us different from a muni or a IOU?

Brian Sharr: 2:04

Midstate is a member-owned cooperative and safety is always our top priority. Protecting the people we serve is at the heart of everything we do. Unlike investor-owned utilities, which are profit-driven and often operate in more urban areas with greater infrastructure and resources, Midstate serves a large rural territory where resources are more limited and our challenges are unique.

Tom Weller: 2:28

Yeah, Midstate, for the most part, is surrounded by forest, dense vegetative areas and grasslands, which are a rural setting. A major fire to a small cooperative like ours could cause damage to property owners, risk of loss of life and homes, and the cost of a fire would cause our rates to skyrocket if we started a fire. City utilities have resources readily available to fight urban fires and limit damages. IOUs can spread their costs across a large section of population, but they still need to be able to return a dividend to their investors.

Jim Anderson: 3:07

Okay. Well, I've got some questions for Brian. You know you're dealing with boots on the ground, mainly our crews out there doing what they do. So when we talk about veg management or vegetation management and brush trimming, what exactly are we doing out there? What are the steps that are involved with it?

Brian Sharr: 3:23

Well, we have 10 areas in our system that we've notched out, that we try to trim every 10 years, but in those 10 areas we prioritize anything that comes up with our technology we use of satellites and drones or customer call-ins. We're trimming all the trees away for safety, trimming all the trees away for safety, and we're mowing the right-of-ways to get rid of the fuel and safe travel down the right-of-way so we can maintain, inspect and get to emergency quicker.

Jim Anderson: 3:53

Okay, I know one of the questions the members always have why do we trim our right-of-ways the way we do? What's the importance of the size and consistency of the right-of-way trimming?

Brian Sharr: 4:02

We trim from ground to sky as far out of the right-of-ways that we are allowed. You know, if we have a 30-foot or a 50-foot right-of-way, that's what we're going to take, along with any danger trees we take out. You know we deem danger, we take them out or top them, mitigate the risk.

Jim Anderson: 4:21

Thank you. What kind of resources we're talking about crews, equipment and planning does it take to carry out the fire mitigation plan here at Midstate? We use a three-man trimming crew that has a 58-foot bucket and also has a chipper alongside and then we have a two-person mowing crew in-house with a support truck, along with communication with federal lands that we are working in there, as long as they're not a closure for birds, frogs or wildlife.

Brian Sharr: 4:58

Yeah, satellite imagery is used to find dead or unhealthy trees that need mitigated in or outside of the right of way.

Jim Anderson: 5:04

Okay, and I guess a follow-up, what would that be? So we've got a lot of our members, homeowners, who are actually on the system. What steps can they take to play a role in our fire mitigation plan? How can they help us?

Brian Sharr: 5:16

They should create their own defensible space. If they have a tree that's near their service line, give us a call. We'll come out and drop the line so you can take it down safely. It we'll come out and drop the line so you can take it down safely. It's the best thing working with the community and giving them an education through our website or even calling us for advice. We're here to help everybody because it helps the community. That's good to know for the membership.

Jim Anderson: 5:36

So let's move back to questions for both of you guys. Engineering system responses. So, Tom, as we move into fire season, what changes do we make in our system settings and what does that actually mean for the equipment?

Tom Weller: 5:49

Well, when we hit fire level three, we go into a non-reclose setting on our distribution feeders and when we hit fire level four, we trip on instantaneous trip settings or extra sensitive settings that allows for midline reclosers to try to coordinate and try and trip before the substation feeder device does Our typical settings, you will see lights go out, blink, then 10, 15 seconds later they'll blink again and followed by another 30 seconds as we try to restore power on that feeder. But during non-reclose, when the tree or animal gets into the line, we completely de-energize the line. When the substation breaker or recloser sees the fault without trying to re-energize, it.

Jim Anderson: 6:40

Okay so. It's like trying to turn it up and make it more sensitive.

Jim Anderson: 6:50

More sensitive settings, faster settings to try and keep from starting fire. So if a member is trying to figure this out in their head, it'd be kind of like your GFI helping protect you from getting shocked at the sink, absolutely.

Jim Anderson: 7:02

It's a much safer device in your house than a standard plug-in. Okay, that's good to know. Well, I guess this leads a question for Brian. So when the settings actually trip out the line, why does it take us longer to actually get the power restored? What checks, what process do you have to do before you bring that line back on?

Brian Sharr: 7:20

Yeah, when we're on fire mitigation settings, we have to look at every piece of that line before we can re-energize it. That's what our policy says and that's what we filed with the state. So that means everything that's in the air has to be looked at until we get to the next section, where we can actually not find a problem and heat that section up and move on down the line. That's why it takes us so long. Some of these feeders can be 30, 40 miles long.

Jim Anderson: 7:46

So we're actually looking for problems that could have happened after the original problem.

Brian Sharr: 7:49

Yes, and you still might not find nothing.

Jim Anderson: 7:52

That's definitely good to know. So hopefully the members understand what we're doing is to help prevent a fire. So let's talk about this. So this first part of this question is for Tom. Walk us through what happens the moment a line trips. What do we see at the co-op? What happens?

Tom Weller: 8:08

Well, when the line trips out, the supervisors on call will get a notification that a breaker opened and then we're immediately calling an alignment to try and get him started moving in the direction to start patrolling, direction to start patrolling. And then we have a lot of different systems that we can look at, different software. We can look at our meters to see what meters are out. We can look at our SCADA system to see, SCADA stands for Supervisor, Control and Data Acquisition to see what devices tripped out, what kind of fault currents we might have seen, and try and help pinpoint where that location is at.

Jim Anderson: 8:47

Okay, this kind of dovetails in, Brian, what you just talked about earlier. So Tom gets ahold of the crew, gets ahold of you, lets you know we've got an outage out there. So, basically, physically the crew, what's their next step?

Brian Sharr: 9:00

First job for them is to go to where the outage started and make sure that everything is what it is. It is off. Then they start from that spot and they themselves down looking at every piece of line, and generally we'll have a couple guys. Hopefully. one can jump ahead you know 10, 12 spans or whatever and get ahead of them. They can work together and work themselves down the line until the next open and then we can energize that piece and then continue to pick people up as we don't find anything.

Jim Anderson: 9:35

Okay. So I guess, tom, you brought up a lot about technology equipment enhancement. Seems like today technology has just taken off and it's growing like crazy. What kind of equipment is mid-statement installing and what time of new, like smart switches or other type of software, do we have that actually helps us respond to this stuff a little faster.

Tom Weller: 9:55

Yeah, well, we're always updating our equipment in our substations, trying to have the piece of equipment there that is capable of trying to analyze the faults and where they occurred. We have our supervisory, control and data acquisition system that relays that information from the relays in the substation and from the midline reclosers. So we have a lot of mid-line reclosers out there to help sectionalize the system up so that we're not having to troubleshoot an entire feeder if we have the ability to sectionalize it. If we have the ability to sectionalize it, we also have fault indicators out there that will tell us if the fault happened beyond that point and to help us to try and troubleshoot and have a faster response.

Jim Anderson: 10:43

Okay, you know I hear a lot out there and I'm sure you guys heard this too. I remember hearing about these arc-containing fuses. That's the new technology that everybody's trying to go to to help keep the fuse from starting a fire. Do they make a difference?

Tom Weller: 10:58

Well, they can, you know, with their standard fuses. They're a fuse link inside a tube and so when it blows, it blows hot metal out into the tube. So the current limiting fuses, or arc fuses, are filled with sand and they help contain that molten fuse link from blowing out so that sand turns to glass and encapsulates it. But they're very expensive and they don't cover all the fuses sizes that we need to cover. So instead we're replacing some of the higher fuses with oil circuit reclosers and replacing the higher circuit reclosers with midline reclosers that are electronic.

Jim Anderson: 11:47

How many fuses do you actually think Midstate actually has on the line, just a ballpark?

Tom Weller: 11:57

Well, we have 20,000 members and I would estimate that we have about 20,000 fuses on our system, even though a transformer can serve three or four. Out on the desert we have members with pivots that they have three fuses per transformer, so roughly 20,000.

Jim Anderson: 12:10

So the cost factor of the fuses is definitely a consideration that Midstate has to take in when we put this together. So, with technology evolving, are we at a point to where we can see real-time what's happening on our lines? Are we close?

Tom Weller: 12:24

We're very close because of our metering system that we have. We have an outage management system that integrates with the SCADA system and the metering system that we have. We have an outage management system that integrates with the SCADA system and the metering system integrates with the OMS system and SCADA. We're getting closer, but trying to put all those systems together is very expensive and takes a lot of time. So right now we're getting close to where we can see real time what's happening on our system and as we change older equipment to newer equipment, we make enhancements and improvements all the time.

Jim Anderson: 13:01

It's definitely good to know With the improvement of our switching equipment. Also, there's a lot of members seeing with drones. We've got a drone company that does a lot of our LiDAR flying over and their technique technology. So how are you guys using drones right now to monitor or inspect the high-risk areas and are they helping us find problems?

Brian Sharr: 13:24

Yes, we are. We're using both drones and satellite imagery. They both got great points for what they do and the satellite imagery comes in really handy when drones can't fly because of fire danger access. We have so much federal lands. We can actually get a picture from outer space and not have to deal with any of the wildlife or the fire mitigation stuff or that stuff like that, because it's huge for us. But yeah, drones and satellite imagery are going to be a constant part going forward.

Jim Anderson: 13:55

is it like Google Earth when somebody's looking at it, or is it more closer to real-time technology that we're getting out of satellites within a 24 or 48-hour window?

Brian Sharr: 14:05

Right now we're not getting that yet, but we do get about a month lag on some of the stuff, so fairly quick. It's good, definitely for stuff that we can mitigate risk with with hazard trees and stuff like that.

Jim Anderson: 14:18

Are there places we can use drones, with Forest Service and with wildlife going through its mating seasons, that the satellite's getting us into, that we weren't able to access before? So is there going to be a benefit to actually having more satellite in the system than drones, or is it still going to be a mix.

Brian Sharr: 14:36

It's still going to be a mix on my part. We're going to have to have a mix. We just have the satellite imagery for more of a backup because of the wildlife limitations we have.

Tom Weller: 14:48

The drones are great because we can actually zoom in on an insulator top, see if it's cracked. We can find problems with lightning arresters by using infrared technology. With the drones we can pinpoint where we have bad lightning arresters. So the drones definitely have their place and definitely provide a big advantage. We had a problem out in Klamath Marsh Wildlife Refuge. Our lines used to be on a dike in the middle of the marsh and inaccessible only by boat, so we had to use drones to fly it.

Jim Anderson: 15:24

It's a good example of how we're actually getting technology to get us in areas that we couldn't get into before. So, tom, I have more questions for you. So, yeah, you see, ai is all over the place. I know you've got a couple of engineers that are really loving the advanced technology that we've got the AI. I won't call them out. I'm sure they're going to be listed as some of who they are. So we've got this AI that's helping us monitor our systems. What is that actually going to do for us in the future, as we bring more AI in to help ?

Tom Weller: 15:54

It's going to point out where we have dead vegetation that you know. Using AI dashes, a company that we're using with satellites, we're able to identify dead vegetation off the right-of-way, and we can do that several times a year. It just helps us eliminate that. We can use AI to control our loads and monitor our loads. So, with our SCADA system, we use a product called Power BI to analyze everything that we're doing. So it helps us with load shaping, voltage optimization.

Jim Anderson: 16:38

So if the AI is just coming in here and we have it fly a line or you guys look at something out there, can it actually flag an area? Can it identify an area? That's a bad area that we need to address?

Tom Weller: 16:47

Absolutely. I mean it can identify where we need to go trim vegetation and where we need to spend our resources more economically.

Jim Anderson: 16:59

Sounds like we are making some great advances Sounds like we are making advances that will really help to membership out and protect the co-op. So you know we all talk about wildlife. I think some people don't realize exactly how many wildfires or fires actually get started by wildlife. So it's not just weather that cause problems for us. How do animals like birds and squirrels actually end up causing a fire? And I know this might be a little sensitive for some folks out there, but this is a cause of a lot of our fires that we have out in the desert and in some of the other areas.

Brian Sharr: 17:32

Yeah, birds build nests on poles and equipment that we have out on the system, and when they build the nest they always bring tree limbs and grass and once that gets built up on there it cuts our clearances down and then pretty soon you've got a fire on your hands and it falls to the ground on fire. Squirrels climb poles, gather on equipment too and they chew through protection. Then they end up getting burnt off the transformer or pole and they fall on the ground and cause a fire. And sometimes birds just come flying through there and they get into it and they fall to the ground on fire. We've seen that several times with the ravens and the crows out there in the desert.

Jim Anderson: 18:09

So are there anything we can, anything that we're doing proactively as far as trying to help protect these incidents on the wires?

Brian Sharr: 18:16

Yeah, we've gone to a new design. You know Raptor framing, what we call in the line trade. Get the phases out farther, put some protection in between the phases so they don't land on transformers, along with insulated wires for tapping transformers or fuses, putting bird guard between phases and on transformers and reclosures.

Jim Anderson: 18:37

You know Midstate is kind of unique compared to a lot of utilities. About 75% of our lines run through federal lands, Forest Service, BLM, state land. Are there seasonal restrictions that impact our ability to access lines to do maintenance?

Brian Sharr: 18:53

Yes, we have a lot of that goes on. It's very impactful to us. You need the weather to cooperate with winter or summer. Certain areas we can be in there, October 1st to March 31st, well, this might be at 6,000, 7,000 feet. So you've got a four to six week window to work on this line. You've got to get that prioritized and called out. Yeah, there's a lot to it. It's tough because we have cabin areas, we have bird nesting areas, we have frog areas, we have unknown wolf activity areas, we have a lot of things that we have to deal with, and it's all over our system.

Jim Anderson: 19:30

Yeah, exactly. So I know that you guys work a lot with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, us Forest Service Bureau of Land Management. Are there other things you have to do before you go out and trim?

Brian Sharr: 19:41

Yes, you have to get ahold of them and make sure there is not a restriction on that area and then, if there is, and if it's work that you need to do, they need to go in and actually verify that there's not a nest and or wolves or calving going on right off the get go. Now if it's an emergency, we can get a waiver, but we still need to contact and move forward, obviously.

Jim Anderson: 20:07

So, outside of just the animals, do you also have to get a permit to actually get into an area to trim with Forest Service land? Yes, you do, and does that hamper how we can actually get out and trim?

Brian Sharr: 20:14

Yes, it does. The only way you can actually go in. There would be an emergency, but you still have to notify. And then, if you want to trim it, you've got to make sure to get a hold of them. And then they've got to study, they've got to go through, and it could take you six months, and then you've got to be able to give them a date when you want to show up and if that date is even available, with fire danger and or winter.

Jim Anderson: 20:35

Right

Brian Sharr: 20:50

Yeah, we're constantly prioritizing our work, whether it be, you know, maintenance on the lines or trimming or mowing. Uh, there's a lot to wrangle because it seems like some of this stuff changes here and there. It was, uh wasn't in an area, now it is. You know, animals don't always have in the same area, so pretty soon you got a whole line that's calving area for two and a half months so I guess you know, as, moving toward the end of our talk here, I want to talk about the shifting fire seasons, looking ahead.

Jim Anderson: 21:17

So this is for both you guys. Every year, fire season starts earlier and earlier. It seems like there's always something happening that's causing us to reevaluate our situation. How are you guys adjusting to that and what are you planning to do if this trend continues?

Brian Sharr: 21:35

Biggest challenge I seek tacking the constantly dying trees for us and aging equipment We've been in the business a long time so we do have some older infrastructure out there and the constant costs to mitigate the risk. I mean this is expensive stuff. That's why we're trying to use technology to help cut down on this cost and be more proactive and more hardening of our system and we're trying new materials that have been tested and they seem to be working really good with what we do to help mitigate risk going forward.

Tom Weller: 22:04

Yeah, I think, tacking on to what Brian says, that every day we look at fire levels out there, we go to the BLM website, we go to the US Forest Service website, we look at FEMA and see what kind of storms might be blowing in and we combine all that information together and we issue a weather report to our line crews and we adjust our substation settings according to what we see out there. As everything dries out, we have to go to the more sensitive settings to keep fires from starting.

Jim Anderson: 22:38

And you brought up weather reports and I think Midstate's probably a little ahead on the curve. We actually have true weather stations at some of our substations that you guys are putting out there, so we're actually getting data that's not just coming from a home-mounted unit. We've got actually a weather station that could be used by NOAA or any of the others out there that could report back. So, is that being incorporated into the decisions that you're making?

Tom Weller: 23:03

Oh, it definitely plays into what we're doing. I mean, the reason we put them out there is so we could have the most up-to-date, accurate information that we possibly can.

Jim Anderson: 23:14

So for both of you guys, what's the biggest challenge that you see for Midstate and fire mitigation and how are we going to prepare for it?

Brian Sharr: 23:25

We are definitely, you know, trying to take an aggressive approach to mitigate all the risk, hardening infrastructure and our vegetation management. Most of all, we need a commitment from our members, as well as to do what they can do at their homes. You know, be a part of the community, be part of helping mitigate the risk as a whole community.

Tom Weller: 23:44

They need to allow us to trim the trees along the right of away. But the biggest challenge I think that I see is our aging infrastructure. You know our system was starting construction in the 1950s and we have a lot of those poles still out there and a lot of the practices of the past dealing with forest service. They wouldn't let us trim unless it was critical. So, you know we have a lot of educating the forest service on best practices and trying to minimize impact of danger trees and using our advanced equipment satellite imagery and we are we're actively embracing new technology and we're actively fire hardening our transmission and distribution grid. We're utilizing the best practices to employ fire mitigation in our designs and construction.

Jim Anderson: 24:39

So, kind of to wrap this up and maybe put a bow on this one. Final thoughts what do you want the members to know about all the work happening behind the scenes to keep the power safe and reliable?

Brian Sharr: 24:50

Well, we have, you know, constant training in this utility, with our guys constantly working with the Forest Service, BLM, other public and private entities. We do a lot to get our guys to be successful. You know, prepare them to be successful for the employees, for our customers, and that's training. Safety meetings, we do job briefings, we do the weather reports. We know where they're going to be. We have a air quality on that. If it's bad in an area, we'll change workflows and put them somewhere else to keep our guys safe.

Tom Weller: 25:27

Now I guess one of the things I would like to stress to our membership is that we value every dollar that we invest in providing a longer lasting fire hardened electric system. Our members are investing money in us and we're investing it in our infrastructure and we're trying to be a responsible and forward-looking cooperative that's, building lines that will survive fires and should last for years to come.

Jim Anderson: 25:49

Thanks, guys. I really appreciate you guys spending a little time. I know your schedules are really busy, as is everybody here at the co-op. If you tuned in today to Power Factor, appreciate it. Hopefully you found this conversation a little bit more in-depth what actually happens with fire mitigation, how we're trying to prepare for it and how we address it here at the co-op.

Jim Anderson: 26:06

We've got a lot of good topics coming your way, including behind-the-scenes looks at the Member Service Department, the MSRs, and an episode that breaks down electric rates. I know everybody's anxious to hear about rates. That's coming up here pretty quick. We're going to talk about how the rates are set, what they cover and what changes are on the horizon. But feel free to actually get into midstateelectric. coop to download this episode. Like it. Pass it off to somebody if you would. We definitely are doing this for you to give you guys an idea of what's happening here at Midstate behind the scenes. You will hear more from Brian and Tom on other episodes coming up. But until next time, stay safe, stay informed and thank you for being a valued Midstate member.