Happy belated National Lineman Appreciation Day. What’d you get? Flowers? A lanyard? We’re back with our second issue of Line Contractor—brought to you by ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR magazine and NECA. I think you will find it useful and interesting.
Our own senior editor Colleen Beaty applies her experience from the Wildlife Habitat Council to dive into vegetation management along power line rights-of-way. Interference with the cables can cause power outages and worse. Promoting native, low-growing vegetation contributes to corporate sustainability, lowers a site’s carbon footprint, benefits wildlife such as songbirds and pollinators, beautifies the landscape and reduces long-term maintenance costs. Read “Rights-of-Way Are for the Birds."
Electric utilities didn’t used to worry about competition. They just sent customers a bill for keeping the power on. Now, utilities see energy consumers as partners, and are placing customer engagement front and center in their business plans. Read “We’re Engaged!” by Chuck Ross.
In this issue, we profile Service Electric Co.’s New River to Wire Road project in Pasco County, north of Tampa. While constructing 20 miles of transmission line and connecting that into seven substations, SEC faced some unexpected situations, not the least of which was having to work energized. Get the details in “Connecting the River to the Road,” by Susan Casey.
In “The Way the Offshore Wind Blows,” Chuck Ross explains what infrastructure goes into harnessing wind energy and plugging it into the onshore grid. Did you know that offshore wind is faster and more consistent than onshore wind? This enables electricity planners to treat it more like fossil-fuel generation when it comes to predicting future output.
We also have a safety briefing, training and compliance columns and new products. I got some positive feedback from some of you about the March magazine, which was a treat. I’m glad you liked it. Let us know if you have a topic you would like us to cover. If you want to share your company’s project with the readers, please contact me at [email protected]. See you in the fall.
