In previous months, I have written about your Cooperative's commitment to providing quality service to its members through the utilization of new technologies and increased focus on some existing maintenance programs such as the vegetation management program.  This month, I would like to discuss some of the traditional maintenance programs that your Cooperative performs every year and how these programs are not considered "new" but are very important in providing reliable service to you, Cooperative members and owners.

Some of you may not realize this but your Cooperative owns and operates over 3,400 miles of distribution line in ten counties of Southeastern Illinois.  Just to put this into perspective, this is enough distribution line to stretch across the United States from Portland, Maine to Los Angeles, California and still have over 300 miles of distribution line remaining.  This distribution system contains over 70,000 wood poles, over 1,500 oil circuit reclosers, over 180 voltage regulators and 35 substations.  These facilities are performing a valuable function every day by delivering your electricity and must be maintained and inspected in order to ensure proper operation.

Every year, your Cooperative is testing and inspecting approximately 10,000 wood poles to determine the condition of the pole.  The testing and inspecting process includes determining the relative strength of the pole, the condition of the pole, locating loose hardware on the pole, inspecting guy wires, etc.  In an average year, your Cooperative will reject some 2% - 3% of the poles tested and change them out with new poles prior to the poles falling unexpectedly during major storms, which could cause a safety concern and an outage for members.

In addition, your Cooperative's distribution system contains over 900 oil circuit reclosers that work to de-energize a line in the event of a problem and isolate the problem so that it minimizes the number of members affected by the problem.  To help you understand what these devices are, I'm sure that some of you have experienced an outage that began by three distinct blinks followed by a prolonged outage.  These oil circuit reclosers were operating in an attempt to keep the line on by de-energizing and re-energizing the line three times before finally locking into an outage condition.  If the problem was temporary in nature, the recloser would have operated one time and your service would have been restored.  These devices perform a critical function not only for minimizing the outages that occur but also helping to provide safety for everyone.  Your Cooperative performs maintenance on approximately 375 of these devices every year in an effort to ensure proper operation.

Your Cooperative's distribution system also contains over 180 voltage regulators that actually control the voltage level to your homes, farms and businesses.  These voltage regulators are mechanical devices that may operate several hundred up to several thousand times per year.  In order to keep them in good working condition, a routine inspection and maintenance schedule must be performed to ensure adequate voltage levels to your services.  Your Cooperative performs maintenance on approximately 50 of these devices every year in an effort to ensure proper operation.

Last but certainly not least, your Cooperative owns and operates 35 substations that contain large substation transformers, protective devices, voltage regulators, switches and much more.  Your Cooperative performs maintenance and inspection related activities that include oil analysis in an effort to determine the transformer's condition, infrared scanning to locate loose connections and "hot spots", protective device maintenance to ensure proper operation, etc.

In summary, your Cooperative owns and operates an extensive distribution system that must be maintained in order to provide you with reliable electric service.  Please know that while your Cooperative is constantly seeking new technologies/procedures that will provide members with an enhanced or increased level of service, your Cooperative continues to perform traditional maintenance programs that are also very important in providing you with reliable electric service.

See you next month and as always, "We'll keep the lights on for you."