WisBusiness.com: Summer energy diagnosis cautiously optimistic

By Joanne M. Haas
WisBusiness.com

COTTAGE GROVE — As warmer weather approaches and power demands strain the state of Wisconsin’s transmission system, a representative for a Midwest power company said the state should withstand the summer heat without any significant problems.

"We are in pretty good health. We’re building just in time or just ahead of the generation that we’re trying to host," said Ken Copp, director of engineering, maintenance and construction for the American Transmission Company. "We still will have a potential this year for scattered low voltages in the system. And we rely on very, very good power plant components. The good news is we are able to host these power plants. The next piece of that sort of contract with them is they have to operate very well for us to have a transmission system that remains healthy."

Copp made those comments during a tour of ATC’s massive operations center, which lies behind an unmarked security gate, surrounded by lush farm fields and burrowed into the earth. From the road, it looks like a man is driving a riding lawnmower atop a hill.

But that hill is really the roof of a a round-the-clock high-tech energy command center anchored by a long, tall wall map complete with lights, letters and lines representing key Midwest electrical pathways. At every moment, in a computer-filled pit, trained personnel monitor transmission routes and substations planted in southern Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa and Minnesota.

"This was built to withstand a tornado," Francis Esselman, ATC’s transmission reliability manager, declared Thursday as he gave media a tour of the operations center.

A tornado might be the least of the worries. With its security cameras, controlled doors within the facility and emergency lock-down capabilities, the center is more like a cross between Fort Knox and Cape Canaveral.

The Pewaukee-based ATC was formed in January 2001 as a single-purpose entity to carry the electrical energy from generation plants to distribution stations. It adopted the transmission operations from several other Midwestern utilities, and now operates 8,900 miles of transmission lines and 450 substations in Wisconsin, Upper Michigan and Illinois.

ATC also has been in the news more since Aug. 14, 2003. That was the day North America’s biggest blackout rolled through the Northeast and into the Midwest and Canada before it stopped at Wisconsin’s border, thanks to highly trained staff who understood
how to handle the emergency that popped up on control screens everywhere, said ATC’s Esselman.

With only four high-voltage lines linking Wisconsin and other states, many in the state were amazed Wisconsin didn’t go black that day. But, said Mark Williamson, ATC’s vice president of major projects, it did serve as a wake-up call to the state as to what could happen unless work continues toward revamping the state’s aging transmission network.

Several weeks ago ATC released a 10-year, $2.8 billion plan — full of upgrades and construction — to ensure a reliable transmission system, as well as improve the ability to import power from other states. It can take somewhere between four and seven years to propose, permit and construct new transmission lines.

Key in that plan is the approved Arrowhead-Weston transmission line, a 345-kilovolt line linking Wisconsin to Minnesota. The transmission line had been the target of intensely aggressive opposition by some landowners who banded together to form SOUL, Save Our Unique Lands. The line was approved in 2001 by the PSC, but the project was reopened for debate after American Transmission announced the initial construction cost estimate had increased by $231 million to about $396 million. Then the PSC approved it again.

Earlier this week, a key committee in Marathon County recommended delaying any county board action regarding ATC’s request for an easement to place its line in the Nine Mile Recreation Area in light of previous votes rejecting the idea dating back to 1999.

Williamson said he is returning to Wausau tonight to meet with officials and explain why the line is crucial to the residents and businesses of the area. The proposed line route also would help relieve what ATC President Jose Delgado has labeled as the nation’s second most constrained transmission line in the nation’s power grid — the line passing through the Eau Claire area.

Williamson said if the plants do not remain healthy and able to feed the system, ATC cannot import from other states until more upgrades and lines completed. “If my power plants don’t work, we don’t have a lot of ability to rely on the neighbors,” Williamson said.

A facility in Sheboygan was affected by the Aug. 14 blackout and automatically shut down itself. Public Service Commission Chair Burnie Bridge said in a previous interview this was what the system was supposed to do.

Delgado, meanwhile, has used his public appearances to stress the need to strengthen the system to support existing and future needs, while reducing the chance the system will fall to a blackout.

Bridge said Wisconsin imports roughly 15 percent of electricity than it generates. “We have four lines into Wisconsin, so we have a limited pathway to import that energy,” she says. “What we’re looking to try to do is upgrade the pathway.”

But that’s not all. Bridge has been leading Energy 2010 Public Forums in various Wisconsin cities recently. So far, the forums have been held in Eau Claire, La Crosse and Madison. Green Bay, Milwaukee and Stevens Point are planned. While a standing-room only crowd was present in Madison, healthy audience participation was also present at the other two.

Last year, Gov. Jim Doyle directed the PSC to initiate a planning process addressing the state’s long-term energy needs. In response to that, the PSC in turn asked Wisconsin utilities to look seven years into the future and provide information on their plans to meet increasing demand. The information is compiled in the draft Strategic Energy Assessment, Energy 2010.

Back to the blackout, Copp said there were key lessons learned. "One is trees — trim them," Copp said, noting a hot wire sags. When it sags, it might touch a tree and shut itself off as one of the internal safeguards. ATC, he added, is in the process of taking care of tree troubles.

Another lesson was the importance of training. System operators are compressing loads of information every three to five seconds, and must be able to make quick important decisions when situations arise.

An emergency simulation drill already was held at ATC as a response to the 2003 blackout, Esselman said. Another is planned in about two weeks.

Meanwhile, operators keep closely tuned to everything — including the Weather Channel, which is visible on a TV perched in the middle of all the computers in the pit.

"Weather affects us a lot," Esselman said. In fact, he says, all the staff has had meteorology training including weather forecasting, That could explain the built-for-tornado toughness.