NEPPA eNewsletter
September 2011
|
Three lovely days on the Maine coast in August is something most of us can enjoy. With beautiful Penobscot Bay sparkling in the sunshine and Hurricane Irene still a long way away, it was a great place and time to get away from our offices, relax with friends and colleagues and catch up on what’s going on in our country and our industry. The 2011 NEPPA Annual Conference, staged at the beautiful Samoset Resort in Rockport, was successful by almost any measure, as members and guests enjoyed informative speakers, tasty meals and evening hospitality suites where they continued the day’s discussions and bragged about their grandchildren, golf games and smart grid programs. Commissioner Spitzer, in his comments, reiterated his belief that the US electric and gas industries must continue to be built upon what he called a "three-legged stool": Markets, Infrastructure and The Rule of Law. He stated that most critics of FERC decisions simply focus on one of these elements, while he and his commissioners must consider all three in making their decisions. Also, despite criticisms of his agency by many in New England over the high rates of return granted to new transmission investments, he strongly defended the Commission’s decisions in this area, stating that the benefits simply "dwarf the costs" of getting new transmission built, when all of the benefits are accounted for. The conference also gave us an opportunity to recognize some individuals and systems that have achieved significant milestones or made important contributions to their communities or our association (see related article). Such recognition is an important part of this annual event, as it provides a brief spotlight on those who most often work behind the scenes. All in all, it was a great few days, and we thank our Maine hosts for the lovely weather and the handsome t-shirts. We will be back to beautiful Samoset again.##SHARELINKS##
|
|
Utility Services Awarded Affiliate of the Year Brian Evans-Mungeon accepted the Affiliate of the Year award on behalf of his company, Utility Services, at NEPPA's 2011 Annual Conference. This award recognizes companies that are associate or corporate members of NEPPA who provide exceptional levels of support or assistance to the organization and its members. Utility Services is known for the work that it does in assisting public power utilities in complying with the requirements of the North American Electric Reliability Corporation. Utility Services has also been a generous and loyal supporter of NEPPA since it joined nearly five years ago. "Whenever asked, and frequently without being asked, Brian has sponsored NEPPA conferences, workshops and golf tournaments and has been a regular attendee at NEPPA events for many years," said NEPPA President John Bilda, who presented the award. "We are indeed fortunate to have Brian and his company as an affiliate member of our association." NEPPA Service Award Presented to Joseph Sollecito Joseph Sollecito of the Taunton Municipal Lighting Plant was presented with a NEPPA Service Award, which is given to individuals who have made significant contributions to NEPPA. During the past five years Sollecito has assumed leadership roles in NEPPA member committees including the Strategic Planning Committee for NEPPA Training, the Customer Service Committee and, most recently, the newly formed Education and Training Committee. "All these committees have benefited from Joe’s experience, his insights and his intelligence," said NEPPA Executive Director Pat Hyland, who presented the award. "As chairman of these committees, he won the respect of his fellow members through his management skills, his planning skills and—most importantly—his listening skills.The success of many of NEPPA’s training programs and customer service conferences in the past five years is directly attributable to Joe’s contributions and ideas." Two Century Awards PresentedBarbara Grimes, NEPPA vice-president, presented two Century Awards to NEPPA members celebrating 100 years of service as a public power system. They are Princeton Municipal Light Department of Massachusetts and the Town of Stowe, Vt. Electric Department. Ellen Burt, General Manager, accepted the award on behalf of Stowe. Groton Commissioner Presented Distinguished Service Award NEPPA’s Distinguished Service Award recognizes individuals who have provided outstanding service to their public power systems and their communities and this year it was awarded to Rodney Hersh, commissioner of the Groton Electric Light Department in Mass. He has served as light commissioner for 19 consecutive years, making him the second-longest serving Commissioner in the Department’s history. "Throughout his years of service," said a Groton spokesperson, "he has always demonstrated an unwavering commitment to protecting the interests of the customers of Groton Electric Light." Three New England Commissioners Presented with AwardsThe Commissioner Service Award is presented annually to Commissioners and Directors of public power utilities who have served their systems with distinction for at least 10 years. NEPPA recognized three individuals for their outstanding service to their utilities with Commissioner Service Awards. From Norwich Public Utilities in Ct. – Mr. James Sullivan From the Reading Municipal Light Department in Mass. – Mr. Philip Pacino And from the Pascoag Utility District in R.I. – Ann Polacek
##SHARELINKS##
|
|
Each year, NEPPA is the beneficiary of financial and other contributions by its affiliates and friends through their sponsorship of the NEPPA Annual Conference. Their contributions are very important to this event, and NEPPA is grateful for their support. The 2011 sponsors were: The Okonite Company Macquarie Energy Public Utility Risk Management Association Starkweather & Shepley Insurance Inc. Utility Services Duncan & Allen Century Bank Spiegel & McDiarmid Rubin & Rudman Morgan Meguire, LLC Energy New England NextEra Energy Resources Invoice Cloud Three-C Electrical Company FISC Solutions Tantalus Systems Arthur J. Hurley Company Marmon Utility – Hendrix Aerial Cable System EDF Trading BP Energy Company Noble Americas Gas and PowerHQ Energy ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
A raffle held at NEPPA's Annual Conference raised $934 for the New England Public Power Benevolent Fund, which was established to aid public power employees or their families who are facing financial difficulties due to disabling accidents, extended illness or loss of life. The New England public power community has a long tradition of rallying to provide support to its family members when tragedy strikes, and participation in this raffle helps to continue that tradition. ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
The devastation wrought by Hurricane Irene in New England brought long, dark days to families and businesses throughout our region. For many, however, the days were longer and more numerous, as the large private electric utilities struggled with extensive service outages and insufficient line crews to keep up with the damage. The usual practice of calling in utility crews and private contractors from outside the system was not particularly effective for this storm, as virtually the entire eastern seaboard of the United States was coping with the same storm, and "outside crews" had to travel long distances to provide assistance. In cases where they were available, lack of familiarity with service territories, roads, streets and distribution circuits only added to the time necessary to make repairs and turn power back on. In such circumstances, the value of community-owned electric utilities is never more apparent. Local line crews who live in or very near their own service territories and are thoroughly familiar with their distribution system need far less time to implement their emergency response plans. Also, long-established working relationships with other municipal public safety departments mean that essential local communications and coordination of resources can take place readily, minimizing confusion and the distribution of erroneous information. In Massachusetts, a fire chief in Sudbury (served by a private utility) said that he was unable to contact any official from the electric utility until 24 hours after the storm hit. Even a day later, he still did not know the extent or location of power outages in his town. The same utility notified public safety officials after the storm that they would not take a priority list of streets to work on from local officials, instead requiring customers to contact them directly. Whatever else might be said of the response efforts of this utility, their communications with local government officials obviously could have used a little improvement. Most of all, many of New England’s public power utilities demonstrated during the past few weeks what the fundamental concept of "local control" is all about. Their managers and crews were on the front lines, cancelling weekend and vacation plans to be sure that sufficient manpower was available to deal with the storm’s effects. When necessary, they were able to call on their fellow public power systems in the region to provide assistance, with whom they already had strong working relationships and a formal mutual aid program. It is always amusing to hear utility industry "experts" praise the virtues of large companies, with their sophisticated outage management systems, customer service programs and economies of scale. As we know here in Massachusetts, an even larger regional utility is being proposed through the merger of NStar and Northeast Utilities. For those who are served by public power systems in New England, Hurricane Irene should be an important reminder that community-owned and operated electric utilities remain the gold standard for customer service, and that the public power "business model" still works pretty well after a century of practice. ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
The Belmont Municipal Light Department (BMLD) has hired Christopher Slattery as its new Director of Operations. He will be responsible for much of the day-to-day business of the department, as well as developing operations plans for utility activities, evaluating and implementing employee training and safety programs and providing key assistance to BMLD’s general manager. Slattery joins BMLD with nearly 30 years of experience in the power industry. He most recently served as distribution scheduler for National Grid where he coordinated scheduling for field workers, ensured compliance with national policies and procedures and conducted safety audits. He was a lead trainer in electrical theory and its relation to devices, circuits and materials and the characteristics of alternating current circuits for Verizon and he also worked for NSTAR for 25 years. Slattery earned a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Boston and has completed several certificate programs at Bentley College, Boston University and Cornell University, among other schools. BMLD General Manager/CEO James Palmer lauded Slattery as a skilled and knowledgeable addition to BMLD. "Chris has a level of work experience and education that will make him a great asset," Palmer said. "He has shown that he is able to lead others both on the jobsite and in the classroom and that he is capable of communicating concepts to others, while at the same time coordinating schedules to provide unmatched customer service. This will be vital in Chris’ new role as director of operations." ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
NEPPA is a member of APPA's Demonstration of Energy-Efficient Developments (DEED) program and NEPPA members are invited to join DEED during three of the program's upcoming webinars. Registration for these webinars for DEED members is completely FREE! Please join in and learn about these innovative projects that fellow APPA DEED members have recently conducted. Below we have provided the general information about these webinars. Click here for a more detailed description of the webinar and to register. ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
Thursday, Sept. 22, 9 a.m. – 2 p.m. ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
EDF Trading of 4700 W. Sam Houston Pkwy. N., Suite 250, Houston, Texas, has joined NEPPA as a corporate member. The contact person is Ben Rich and he can be reached at (281) 653-1736. EDF Trading is a provider of power and gas energy management and retail supply services to North America. Their business platform enables them to originate structured transactions, produce competitive pricing and effectively manage risk for their clients. Their strength comes from operational excellence, state-of-the-art IT systems and a strong credit rating. Evluma of 624 Rainier Ave. S., Seattle, Wash., has joined NEPPA as a corporate member. Keith Miller may be reached at (206) 720-1798. Evluma manufactures rugged solid-state illumination products that save energy, reduce light pollution and curtail maintenance costs. The Clearlight line of luminaires for dusk-till-dawn fixtures replaces mogul base 50-175W Mercury Vapor and 70-150W High-Pressure Sodium bulbs. Thermal Energy Storage of Maine of Biddeford, Maine, has joined NEPPA as a corporate member. The contact person is Samuel Zaitlin and he can be reached at (207) 283-4448. TESM works with public and private utilities to establish space and hot water heating programs using electric thermal storage (ETS) technology. TESM is the manufacturer's representative for the Steffes Corporation, North America's sole manufacturer of ETS systems. World Energy has joined NEPPA as a corporate member. Andrew Thomas is the main contact and he can be reached at (508) 459-8100. The firm provides utilities, municipalities and other wholesale energy buyers with more efficient and transparent ways to source their energy needs. More than 65 top utilities are under contract with World Energy for help when buying and selling power, natural gas, capacity and other physical and financial products. They offer an array of wholesale transactions, from spot market buys to seasonal capacity and annual energy procurements and they are helping utilities manage tactical and strategic programs with increased efficiency, transparency and success. They understand that each utility brings its own methodology and experience to energy transactions. Their role is to support and enhance these existing processes. The merits of this approach have helped their customers win the praise of independent industry monitors and achieve a perfect record of PUC rate-case approvals. E.L. Howard Utility Services of 2 Center Plaza, Suite 510, Boston, Mass., has joined NEPPA as an associate member. The contact person is Eugene Howard and he can be reached at (781) 718-9026. E.L. Howard does installation and maintenance of underground high voltage distribution services. ##SHARELINKS##
|
##SHARELINKS##
|
|
Bob Henriksen, NEPPA contract trainer since the mid-nineties, has recently taken on a project that will greatly benefit NEPPA member utilities. After a serious electrical accident occurred in a public power system in Massachusetts, investigation brought to light that most municipal utilities do not have written work procedure documents in place. Henriksen got in touch with the Massachusetts Department of Labor and started communicating with Nancy Pearce who helped him draft a work procedure document for NEPPA members. The manual will outline how employees who work with electricity should do their jobs the safest possible way and can be customized to each utility. The end result will be that each utility will have something in writing when an accident occurs. "It was a lot of work but I really enjoyed this project," said Henriksen. "And it’s nice to know that this document could prevent a future accident from occurring." NEPPA will be mailing the manual to general managers in the near future. ##SHARELINKS##
|
|
NEPPA is pleased to announce a partnership with Energy Management University (EMU), an online training service specializing in electric utility learning programs for all classes of utility employees. Presently, EMU offers more than 80 Web-based courses written specifically for the electric utility industry. Ranging in length from one to two and a half hours, the courses can be accessed at any time from any computer with internet access and may be started, stopped and resumed to fit the users’ schedules and preferences. In addition to featuring viewer-friendly photos, graphics, diagrams and illustrations, the courses are also "interactive" with self-test quizzes and comprehensive exams included in each module. While exams are optional, students who take them (and attain a passing score) will be awarded certificates from EMU. Through its partnership with EMU, NEPPA will make these courses available to its members for one year (Nov. 1, 2011 to Oct. 31, 2012). Each utility may grant access to these courses to as many of their employees as they wish. The participation fee will be $250 per utility for the 12-month period. Utilities that wish to participate should contact Rockie Blunt at rblunt@neppa.org or call Rockie at (508) 482-5906. ##SHARELINKS##
|
