As the co-general manager/CEO of Slope Electric Cooperative, I’m accustomed to members’ questions about power outages and why it can take time to get the lights back on. Given our reliance on electricity, there’s simply never a good time to be without it.
This month, I’d like to shed light on our restoration process to help our members understand what may be happening behind the scenes. Here are some things you might not know about restoration:
We need you. When your power goes out, it might be just at your home or small section of a neighborhood. There is a chance we may not know about it and no one has reported it. We rely on you to let us know if your power is out.
We assess the situation first. Every outage is different, and we don’t know how dangerous it is or what equipment might need to be replaced. When responding to outages, we first need to see what happened, then figure out what materials we need and a plan for how to fix the problem(s) without compromising electric flow for the rest of our members. Restoration is normally prioritized by the largest number of members we can get back on in the shortest amount of time.
Our employees face many dangers. Besides working around high voltage electricity, our crews are on alert for weather elements, falling trees and fast-moving cars.
Flickering lights are a good thing. Some folks mistake flickering lights for outages, but these “blinks” are important because they indicate our equipment worked and prevented a possible outage likely caused by wayward animals or stray tree limbs on the lines.
Sometimes it’s a waiting game. Our portion of the power grid is connected to other electric utilities, and we maintain positive relationships with power providers interconnected to our system. If our outage is due to an issue from their feed into our system, we must let them do their repairs and be mindful of what they’re going through to fix it.
We do our best to avoid power disruptions, but they are inevitable from time to time. If the lights go out, know that your co-op team is working as quickly and safely as possible to restore power. If you experience an outage, please let us know by reporting it on SmartHub or by calling 701-579-4191.