Bury the power lines

[Plutonic Panda]

That is all.

Really though, this is a good article. Even if the price tag came out to be 30 billion, it'd be worth it, imo. It can be done in phases.

Another thing I'd like to see is power lines being buried in all road construction. So if a road is being reconstructed, the power lines get buried. Why Edmond didn't do this with the Covell and Kelly is beyond me and annoying. This would make the cities look so much better.

Why doesn't Oklahoma bury power lines? | News, Weather, Sports, Breaking News | KOKH

[adaniel]

I think most people would rather run the risk of 12-24 hours of inconvenience every few years over a extra $2,700 a year out of their pocket.

[jerrywall]

They tend to bury them with new work. The trouble is, I'm not sure if you could ever get 100% buried. My entire area of town has the lines buried, and we still lost power. Now for us, they were short outages (2 hours was the longest.... right during the game) and off and on overnight. I do agree they need to continue to do it with new construction. OG&E does, and much of Edmond has buried lines.

[Plutonic Panda]

I think most people would rather run the risk of 12-24 hours of inconvenience every few years over a extra $2,700 a year out of their pocket.

Yeah I doubt that would be the price.

Also, if you read the article it says

Another study, done by the U.S. Energy Information Administration shows a the cost between $1 million and $2.2 million per mile.

And I am not suggesting OG&E goes and raises 30 billion to bury every power line right now. It can be done over time and in phases.

Tornado takes out a bunch of power lines? Work with the city to identify whether the road is going to be widened soon and bury the lines that were destroyed accordingly.

New road? Bury the utility lines.

Reconstructing or widening a road? Bury the utility lines.

Doing anything that requires the utility lines to be relocated? Bury the portion that was relocated.

Pros

Overtime, it'll save costs to OG&E that can be passed onto the consumer(which OG&E doesn't seem to like to do).

Won't have to worry about someone hitting the poles with their cars, a windstorm knocking them down, ice storm, tornado. . . etc.

Huge aesthetic boost for Oklahoma and Oklahoma City.

[Plutonic Panda]

They tend to bury them with new work. The trouble is, I'm not sure if you could ever get 100% buried. My entire area of town has the lines buried, and we still lost power. Now for us, they were short outages (2 hours was the longest.... right during the game) and off and on overnight. I do agree they need to continue to do it with new construction. OG&E does, and much of Edmond has buried lines.

Can you tell me where they have buried them? Because they sure didn't do it with the reconstruction of Covell and Kelly and they aren't doing it with upcoming construction of Covell and I-35 because they are building new ones.

I do know of one or two small projects recently that I don't know exactly which ones they were, but they did bury them, but it was a small project.

I do agree with you that they will never be 100% buried and I'm fine with that. I'm thinking the majority of them being buried in OKC and the surrounding suburbs.

[Plutonic Panda]

Also, for anyone that will say there is better ways to spend that kind of money. I just want to point out, there are always better ways to spend money.

[Zuplar]

Yeah I doubt that would be the price.

Also, if you read the article it says



And I am not suggesting OG&E goes and raises 30 billion to bury every power line right now. It can be done over time and in phases.

Tornado takes out a bunch of power lines? Work with the city to identify whether the road is going to be widened soon and bury the lines that were destroyed accordingly.

New road? Bury the utility lines.

Reconstructing or widening a road? Bury the utility lines.

Doing anything that requires the utility lines to be relocated? Bury the portion that was relocated.

Pros

Overtime, it'll save costs to OG&E that can be passed onto the consumer(which OG&E doesn't seem to like to do).

Won't have to worry about someone hitting the poles with their cars, a windstorm knocking them down, ice storm, tornado. . . etc.

Huge aesthetic boost for Oklahoma and Oklahoma City.

I agree with all this last part. Definitely needs to be something done going forward, and over time it will take care of itself and really help speed getting power restored when things like this do happen. I think the big problem is when stuff like this happens, people just want power, so they are more than willing to just patch and fix what's there. I can't say I blame them, but at least it's something more people are paying attention too.

[jerrywall]

Can you tell me where they have buried them? Because they sure didn't do it with the reconstruction of Covell and Kelly and they aren't doing it with upcoming construction of Covell and I-35 because they are building new ones.

I do know of one or two small projects recently that I don't know exactly which ones they were, but they did bury them, but it was a small project.

I do agree with you that they will never be 100% buried and I'm fine with that. I'm thinking the majority of them being buried in OKC and the surrounding suburbs.

I can't give specific examples. I know that much of west Edmond has buried lines, although there are stretches of feeder lines. From what I recall, Edmond has a long time goal of burying as much of the power lines as possible. I know new neighborhoods especially tend to have the lines buried. Not sure on the Kelly/Covell issues. There may have been a cost/benefit analysis or a time issue. I think in terms of miles of lines, there are a lot more buried in Edmond than their used to be. They seem to be focusing on the neighborhoods I assume because those are the hardest to fix when issues happen, while an outage along the road is quicker to fix. I remember reading an article back some point, I'll have to see if I can find it, that there goal is to get as much of Edmond's power lines underground as possible, over time as you've suggested.

[jerrywall]

In fact, my guess looks to be accurate.... assuming Edmond and OKC have been using the same logic as Tulsa, I found this talking about their program...

“Because feeders usually are on poles along street right-of-way and are easy to access, they are not buried,” Whiteford said. “The problems in areas we convert relate directly to heavy tree growth and difficulty accessing rear lots.”

Laterals are buried in front right-of-way, usually within 8 feet of the curb.

“We place a 2-by-2-by-3-foot, pad-mount transformer every three or four houses,” Whiteford said. “We directionally drill services to each house and replace existing meters with RF meters, which are read from the street. When a neighborhood is complete, we never have to go in the back yard again. All future repairs can be made in the front. Whether the access service point is a transformer or flush-mount pedestal, repairs are much quicker with less impact to the homeowner. No worry about downed lines. No locked gates. No dog bites.”

During planning stages of the reliability-enhancement program, PSO evaluated neighborhoods to identify the best candidates for replacing aerial lines underground.

“Most of those selected,” he said, “are older neighborhoods, usually with many old, large trees. In looking at the process we identified between 700 and 800 miles of overhead distribution cable that converting to underground would have a significant impact to improving reliability.”

Criteria considered when targeting areas were the following:

• Accessibility: Without alleys in the city, back yards can be difficult to access for repairs.

• Terrain: Is it conducive to directional drilling? Planners wanted to use this technique and avoid trenching.

• History of reliability

“For the first underground conversion,” Whiteford said, “we selected an area that was reasonably representative of the city—one where trees were causing problems, but not one of the worst areas in terms of reliability problems. It was a good starting point.”

Considering all factors, Whiteford said PSO is pleased with progress.

“We have converted roughly 65 miles of aerial cable to underground,” he said. “And we believe we are getting better at it as we proceed. Engineering is more nailed down. Contractor crews are more efficient.”

[Plutonic Panda]

I can't give specific examples. I know that much of west Edmond has buried lines, although there are stretches of feeder lines. From what I recall, Edmond has a long time goal of burying as much of the power lines as possible. I know new neighborhoods especially tend to have the lines buried. Not sure on the Kelly/Covell issues. There may have been a cost/benefit analysis or a time issue. I think in terms of miles of lines, there are a lot more buried in Edmond than their used to be. They seem to be focusing on the neighborhoods I assume because those are the hardest to fix when issues happen, while an outage along the road is quicker to fix. I remember reading an article back some point, I'll have to see if I can find it, that there goal is to get as much of Edmond's power lines underground as possible, over time as you've suggested.

Okay that's great to hear. I was unaware of that.

I do know of a couple of projects that have buried lines in Edmond, so we might be thinking of the same ones. But I can't remember exactly what they were either.

[bchris02]

I like this idea in theory, but I think in many areas around here it is simply cost prohibitive. I would support burying them in the high-density areas of the metro. Unfortunately, low-density suburbs and rural areas are simply going to have to deal with the inconvenience of power outages every few years when inclement weather strikes if they don't want to take on the additional costs it would require to have the lines buried.

[gopokes88]

If OKCtalk posters ran the world we'd be bankrupt in 2 mins. Between JTF's new airport in the middle of no where and panda's power lines we're already half way there.

[Pete]

Many other cities bury them, even in dense areas.

Frankly, I'm not sure I trust OG&E to get a fair assessment of what it would cost per mile, especially because their attempt to brush this off resulted in an estimate everyone seems to agree is greatly inflated.

They just don't want to do it, that part is clear.

[bchris02]

Many other cities bury them, even in dense areas.

I think OKC should bury them in dense areas. With high population density I think it would be worth the cost to do it. An ordinance could also be passed to require them buried when new subdivisions are built.

However, going in and retroactively burying them in areas where they are currently above ground on the suburban fringe and in rural areas would be very cost prohibitive.

Out of curiosity, what other cities bury them citywide? I am familiar with Kansas City, Dallas, Little Rock, and Charlotte, and all of them have above ground power lines.

[Pete]

I checked into doing this once, as I was looking to buy a house that like most in OKC, had a long power and phone line strung across the backyard from a line of power poles.

As I recall, it was not a big expense to have it buried and homeowners can definitely contract such work out.

[tfvc.org]

When I lived in Fl, I lived in an apt complex that had buried power lines, the box that served the part of the complex I lived in seemed to be in an area that got flooded fairly often, and when it was flooded the power in my area went out. I could see the apartments in the front part of the complex have power but the back ones not, I am not sure if the power company didn't care, but they sure knew about that box getting flooded and they didn't seem to be able to do anything about it, so my point is buried lines aren't always the golden ticket to preventing power outages.

[OKCisOK4me]

Apparently you didn't see the news this morning where they said that that cost would be turned over to the customers resulting in $80-$260 monthly increases for 30 years afterward. NO THANK YOU!

[Spartan]

Really though, this is a good article. Even if the price tag came out to be 30 billion, it'd be worth it, imo. It can be done in phases.


And I am not suggesting OG&E goes and raises 30 billion to bury every power line right now. It can be done over time and in phases.

We don't have $30 billion. That's about half the entire OKC metro economy.

It's not just the cost of burying the lines. What few buried lines we do have wreaked havoc on Project 180. It doesn't reduce headaches going forward, it just replaces them with different headaches.

And what about earthquakes?

[OKCretro]

Only issue I have with OG&E (as I still don't have power) is that they said on their twitter page that they " repair the hardest hit areas first". So instead of going to fix the most heavily populated areas they go after the outskirts if they are harder it.
Not taking into account how many people effected is a horrible policy. They will fix sq miles that have 10 people quicker than a downtown okc neighborhood with 100's of people in a square mile if the 10 people sq mile is "harder hit"


they claimed el reno was the hardest hit so they fixed el reno first.

Makes me think most of the oG&E workers live in El reno.........

[jerrywall]

As conservative, republican, anti-government as I am, I love Edmond Electric. Non-profit, monthly reports, and great service. Would hate to trade it for a for profit energy company.

[gopokes88]

Also in 25 years when a majority of homes are off the grid, we just wasted freaking 30 billion dollars on something we no longer need.

[Pete]

Also in 25 years when a majority of homes are off the grid, we just wasted freaking 30 billion dollars on something we no longer need.

The laws and tax incentives in Oklahoma are very biased against solar and alternative energy (and towards energy companies) and there is simply no way any significant percentage of homes are off the grid in any of our lifetimes.

Also, the comment about earthquakes... Never been a problem in California and in fact, you could argue underground is better as opposed to poles and powerlines coming down in a big event.

And it wouldn't cost anywhere near $30 billion, that is just OG&E's way of trying to brush aside the idea.

[jerrywall]

The laws and tax incentives in Oklahoma are very biased against solar and alternative energy (and towards energy companies) and there is simply no way any significant percentage of homes are off the grid in any of our lifetimes.

I'd be interested in knowing how this is true. I know we tax profits people make selling energy back into the grid, but to be fair they are using the grid at that point and should share the burden. But if you don't sell excess energy back I'm not away of any taxes or laws that would prohibit your use. I know a few people that have totally gone off the grid with solar, wind, and batteries.

[gopokes88]

The laws and tax incentives in Oklahoma are very biased against solar and alternative energy (and towards energy companies) and there is simply no way any significant percentage of homes are off the grid in any of our lifetimes.

Also, the comment about earthquakes... Never been a problem in California and in fact, you could argue underground is better as opposed to poles and powerlines coming down in a big event.

And it wouldn't cost anywhere near $30 billion, that is just OG&E's way of trying to brush aside the idea.

Current laws are that way. The free market will always win out. As other states adopt it the technology grows and grows gets cheaper and cheaper you will see a shift.

It's not unreasonable to think in 25 years for $1,000 (in today's $) you could get solar panels and a battery pack in your home. The people who make the rules need votes. When the technology gets cheap enough, it'll tip the other way. Also, because of term limits the legislature will have turned over twice.

So yes, in 25 years over 50% of homes will be off the grid. (By off the grid I mean, they occasionally have a power bill but for the most part it's $0)

[Pete]

It's not just the taxation and charges, it's the lack of tax incentives, low-interest loans, etc.

There are reasons you see so little solar in Oklahoma. Absolutely tons of it in California, which offers all types of incentives.

Just read that of 800,000 OG&E customers, only 200 to 400 use any solar or wind power.

Also, OG&E will only reimburse you for the amount of energy you actually use; they will not pay you for any extra that is fed back into the grid.