What is York Electric’s procedure for restoring power?

Restor­ing pow­er after wide­spread out­ages is a big job that involves more than sim­ply throw­ing a switch or remov­ing a tree from a line. The main goal is to safe­ly restore pow­er to the great­est num­ber of mem­bers in the short­est time pos­si­ble. In order to accom­plish this, the process begins with a dam­age assess­ment of the co-op’s lines and facil­i­ties by employ­ees who have been specif­i­cal­ly trained to accom­plish those tasks. The assess­ment allows YEC to direct its resources (both labor and mate­ri­als) to areas where they are need­ed the most.

If there is dam­age to pow­er plants, switch­yards, or trans­mis­sion lines, those facil­i­ties must be repaired by our pow­er sup­pli­er before we can restore your ser­vice. Trans­mis­sion lines sel­dom fail, but they can be dam­aged by storms. Tens of thou­sands of peo­ple could be served by a sin­gle high-volt­age trans­mis­sion line. When those facil­i­ties are work­ing, prob­lems in your co-op’s elec­tric dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tem can be cor­rect­ed.

Sub­sta­tions are repaired first. When a major out­age occurs, the local dis­tri­b­u­tion sub­sta­tions are checked first. If the prob­lem can be cor­rect­ed at the sub­sta­tion lev­el, pow­er may be restored to a large num­ber of peo­ple. YEC has 24 sub­sta­tions on its sys­tem and there are over 3,500 miles of dis­tri­b­u­tion lines which are rout­ed from the sub­sta­tions.

Dis­tri­b­u­tion lines are repaired. Main dis­tri­b­u­tion sup­ply lines are checked next, if the prob­lem can­not be iso­lat­ed at the sub­sta­tion. These sup­ply lines car­ry elec­tric­i­ty away from the sub­sta­tion to a group of mem­bers, such as a sub­di­vi­sion. When pow­er is restored at this stage, all mem­bers served by this sup­ply line could see the lights come on, as long as there is no prob­lem far­ther down the line.

Indi­vid­ual ser­vices restored. The final sup­ply lines, called ser­vice lines, car­ry pow­er from the trans­former on util­i­ty poles or under­ground trans­form­ers out­side hous­es or oth­er build­ings. Line crews fix the remain­ing out­ages based on restor­ing ser­vice to the great­est num­ber of mem­bers. Some­times, dam­age will occur on the ser­vice line between your house and the trans­former on the near­by pole. This may explain why you have no pow­er when your neigh­bor does.