Glen Rose: What We're Doing

Posted Sept. 10, 2020
Updated: Sept. 28, 2020

Homes and businesses in Glen Rose have been affected by multiple outages in recent weeks.

We understand this is frustrating and that you may be concerned about what efforts are under way to keep the lights on. For that reason, we want to let you know what's happened and what we are doing.

We would like for Glen Rose customers to know that we are committed to keeping our system reliable in your community and all others we serve.

Background

A major capital investment project to rebuild and upgrade the Glen Rose substation has been under way since July. This improvement will enable TNMP to meet increased electricity demand in the region with updated equipment that will improve reliability. The finishing touches on the substation are estimated to be complete by December 15.

We understand that outages make for long days and / or nights and have become frustrating. This work is necessary to improve the reliability of service to the Glen Rose Area.

What has caused recent outages?

August 2: While conducting scheduled upgrades, power was interrupted at the substation. This affected approximately 3,700 homes and businesses. The problem was quickly identified and power to 2,100 customers was restored within minutes. Power to the remaining customers was restored as soon as repairs were completed.
August 13 (first outage): TNMP scheduled a brief outage to transfer the load to a mobile substation. De-energizing was necessary to perform the work safely. Equipment failure during the process extended the outage. This affected approximately 2,900 homes and businesses. Crews worked quickly to rectify the problem and restore power.
August 13 (second outage): While conducting scheduled work on the substation, a utility pole failed and compromised the work being performed. This outage affected approximately 2,900 homes and businesses. Crews worked to replace the pole and restore power.
August 16: There was a storm in the area, bringing extremely high winds that caused the outage. Crews were able to quickly identify the problem and restore power. This affected approximately 2,000 homes and businesses.
September 1: Severe weather triggered an outage as lightning damaged equipment and downed trees. Crews were dispatched to repair and/or replace the damaged equipment and clear the downed trees from our lines. Approximately 3,000 homes and businesses were affected.
September 7: Equipment failure triggered an outage which affected approximately 500 customers. Crews were quickly dispatched and worked to restore power.
September 25: A contractor changing out transmission poles the prior day raised the transmission lines in a way that left them too close to the cross arm on an adjacent structure. When cool weather occurred in the early morning hours, the line made contact with the cross arm, locking out a substation breaker.

Some customers may have experienced other, small outages in this time frame. However, the outages referenced above were those that affected larger numbers of customers.

What is TNMP doing about those outages?

Immediately

Vegetation management crews will concentrate on areas within Glen Rose to trim trees that may compromise the reliability of service.
Utility crews are visually inspecting our power lines and poles in the area to ensure there are no apparent issues.
TNMP is installing additional equipment to limit the number of customers exposed to an outage.

Long term

We are upgrading our transmission facilities between Walnut Springs and Glen Rose, including replacing old wood poles with steel poles and clearing the right of way.
The new steel poles are stronger and can be expected to stand up better against severe weather like high winds and ice storms, thus decreasing the chances of unplanned outages during those events.
Both the transmission upgrade and the substation rebuild under way are designed to improve overall service and provider greater reliability to the Glen Rose area.

Will there be more outages like this during the project?