From the Desk of the CEO

In early July, Hurricane Beryl made landfall in southeast Texas and caused significant damage in the Houston area in particular. Millions of Texans lost power, homes and businesses were damaged, and numerous people died as a result of the storm itself and the ensuing outages. I offer my deepest condolences to those families who have experienced unspeakable loss. I would also like to acknowledge the work performed in the field and in control centers during the restoration efforts that often involved complicated and dangerous situations.

Initial information indicated that trees and limbs falling onto distribution lines were a significant cause of the outages. Although the early reports denote that it was mostly the distribution system which was impacted, I wanted to take the opportunity to highlight FAC-003-4 which directly addresses vegetation management for overhead transmission lines. Entities are encouraged to build out their programs with overall system reliability in mind.

When the U.S.-Canada Power System Outage Task Force released the final report on the 2003 Northeast blackout, one of the major findings was that the utilities involved had “average” vegetation management programs, and had they done more to prune and manage the trees around their transmission lines, the blackout wouldn’t have occurred. This is why the ERO Enterprise regularly prioritizes vegetation management in outreach to registered entities.

As is the case whenever nature intrudes on us, we recognize that vegetation management isn’t a simple variable to solve for. Some trees grow faster than others and some get struck by lightning and fall over. Tracking developments across potentially thousands of miles of power lines is a challenge. Like many things in our industry, meeting this challenge isn’t just an expense; it’s also an investment with a potential to pay dividends resulting in reduced outages from storms.

Adhering to best practices for vegetation management can benefit a registered entity in a wide variety of ways. Not least among them is the reduced need to repair damaged lines. It’s easier and safer to spot and trim a potentially problematic tree than it is to dispatch a repair crew—especially after a storm where restoration efforts may require attention at dozens of locations across a large service area. Not only does this improve reliability, but it also improves resilience. If fewer repairs need to be made after a major event, the system can recover more quickly, benefitting everyone.

I’m encouraged to see entities taking this critical issue seriously, learning from the past, and implementing proactive steps to ensure our electric grid is secure and resilient.

Reliably,
Jim Albright