Puget Sound Energy officials were put on the hot seat this week in Langley when South Whidbey residents got a chance to vent about the string of recent power outages.

Jerry Henry of PSE led the discussion, backed up by two of the company’s engineers and the company’s emergency management specialist.

Henry acknowledged that this year has been tough for PSE customers on Whidbey Island and elsewhere.

“This year’s storms and resulting power outages were the worst we have ever experienced,” Henry said.

Henry, an engineer with nearly

40 years’ experience with the utility, is the company’s senior advisor to PSE chairman Steve Reynolds.

Repairs from winter storms on Whidbey Island will cost the company about $3.5 million. To repair the entire system damaged by storms, it will cost the company $60 million to $80 million.

Henry also admitted the company’s service on Whidbey Island has been lacking.

“We have to figure out a way to provide a higher level of service to Whidbey Island. It has been substandard this winter,” he said.

Henry also acknowledged that the island’s power line system and the reliability of the system was “substandard” and that the company “must do better.”

Burying power lines

The challenges of the last power outages were still fresh in the collective minds of the audience, and the PSE representatives faced a number of angry remarks by audience members.

One of the hot topics was putting power lines underground. Many audience members didn’t believe that burying power lines was as expensive as the company claimed.

Henry, however, said putting lines underground is costly, and said it was also sometimes difficult to bury power lines in rural areas.

The cost of undergrounding lines varies, Henry said. It can cost an average of $2.5 million per mile for distribution lines to be buried, and $8 million to $10 million a mile for transmission lines to be placed underground. Transmission lines serve the island as a whole, while the smaller distribution lines only serve particular areas and fewer customers.

Putting power lines underground has been a popular idea on Whidbey since the recent series of blackouts. But Henry said undergrounding all of the lines on Whidbey Island is probably not feasible due to the high costs involved. Still, he said it could be done in selected “hot spots” where trees area known to blow down.

“There are already some underground power lines on Saratoga Road. We may have to do more,” he said.

PSE officials vowed to review what happened to its power system during the recent storms, and would look as well at what the utility does to keep trees and branches from knocking out lines.

Henry said the company spends $15 million a year in vegetation management alone.

Critics take aim

That was still not enough for some.

Steve Erickson, a local activist, quoted a paper by the Commission of the European Communities concerning undergrounding lines in Europe.

Erickson said according to the paper, undergrounding some types of lines was only two times more expensive than stringing lines in the air, while other lines were just three times the cost of overhead lines.

Henry said PSE estimates were sound and based on American material and labor costs; European estimates of powerline installations may include other variables.

PSE was criticized by some not only for its recent response to the blackouts, but also for not taking advantage of opportunities years ago.

Ed Jenkins said the power company had the chance to bury power lines when Whidbey Telecom put its phone lines underground.

“Why didn’t you do it then?” Jenkins asked.

“You have a monopoly,” he added. “We don’t have a choice.”

Henry said it didn’t make economical sense to underground power lines 20 years ago, and installing lines underground was more complex than laying phone lines.

Given the tremendous cost of repairs in recent months, Dick Robins wanted to know if the cost of undergrounding the lines was a wash.

“There were crews from Georgia. Wouldn’t it be a better investment to underground the lines?” he asked.

Henry again noted that putting lines underground in some areas was necessary, but still more expensive than restoring downed lines.

Langley generator

Many audience members were concerned with creating “islands of light” in certain areas and said some places should have back-up power systems that could provide a safe haven for residents. The Langley generator quickly came up.

South Whidbey residents nostalgically remember the era when a large generator backed up Langley’s power system and also powered surrounding areas reaching as far as Bayview and Clinton.

Repeated blackouts over the past few months have left some wondering whatever happened to Langley’s generator.

Langley Mayor Neil Colburn shed some light on the topic.

“Well, it wasn’t ours,” Colburn said. “In fact, we weren’t asked when it was sold.”

The generator was owned by a bank and leased by PSE. In the late 1990s it was sold to Peru.

Kim Tiller, a business woman in Langley, wanted to know why the generator was removed and what it would take to replace it.

Tiller said an alternative power source was needed to keep businesses open.

Susan Cyr, a Langley resident, agreed.

“My family and I would like to see maybe a smaller generator come back to Langley,” Cyr said.

Henry said a generator was not out of the question. Utility officials, though, are looking at a number of options to improve service on Whidbey Island. Options include more aggressive tree trimming and vegetation management, expanded rights-of-ways and putting lines underground in selected areas or hot spots. Hot spots include Brooks Hill Road and Saratoga Road, where trees and limbs traditionally topple into power lines during windy storms.

Henry said PSE is taking a hard look at the way it responds to power outages.

On Whidbey Island alone, there have been six separate storms since November that have resulted in lost power. On two occasions, all of Whidbey lost power.

The company has instituted an internal audit of its system and an independent auditing firm is looking at the way that PSE has responded to the storms. The report will be made public once it is finished.

“We’re looking at our entire system. We want to know if we have issues with our standards and practices,” Henry said.

Some in the audience wondered about the origin of the blackout-causing storms. Elliot Menache asked the panel if PSE considered global climate change as a factor in the recent surge of storms.

Henry had a simple answer.

“Frankly, we don’t know,” he said.

Henry added that the company works with meteorologists at the University of Washington, but that nobody could say for certain if the recent storms were a fluke of nature or will be the norm for upcoming years.

“The outage record far exceeds anything we have ever seen,” he said.

“If they are going to happen every five years, we have to address the problems,” he said.

While PSE officials admitted to shortcomings during the outages and discussed ways to address the problems, they did not commit to any particular solutions.

While vegetation management and improving the system are great ideas, some audience members wanted more specifics.

“I am a little concerned that you’ll end up with a case of analysis paralysis,” Kelly Beers said.

Improving response to emergencies is also a focus on state level.

State regulators will hold an all-day workshop Feb. 8 in Olympia to discuss the response of energy and telephone companies to last December’s windstorms.

The Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission has scheduled the meeting from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 8 in the second-floor hearing room at the commission headquarters, 1300 S. Evergreen Park Dr. S.W., Olympia. The workshop is open to the public.

There will be two sessions. The morning session will focus on electricity-related problems with public comments scheduled from 11:45 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The afternoon session will address telephone and cable-related problems with public comment scheduled for 3 p.m.

Wednesday’s community meeting with PSE officials was held as part of The South Whidbey Record’s Exchange series. About 10 people testified out of nearly 50 people who attended two-hour plus meeting.