My grandmother who is in her 80s walks to church every Sunday, still tends a garden and rakes her yard.  She’s a pretty spunky lady and set in her ways.  And she doesn’t want anyone messing with her trees or yard!

She’s like a lot of our members who complain when we go spraying or cutting on what has been termed the “right of way.”

Those of us in the electric utility industry call it “vegetation management.”  And although it may be a nuisance to some of our members -- it is essential to Wiregrass Electric in providing safe and reliable electric service.

WEC works hard to ensure that rights of way are regularly cleared of trees and brush to help reduce potential outages and hazards. Trees and branches growing in or near power lines can break and fall, causing interruptions in your electric service. Uncontrolled brush can impede access to utility poles and lines.

Keeping safety first

Trees and branches pose significant safety concerns when they are too close to power lines. Children climbing trees could be severely injured or even killed if they contact an energized line. Adults are also at risk. Pruning trees near power lines should be left to qualified vegetation management professionals.

Additionally, trees can fall into power lines due to strong wind and stormy weather. Not only can power lines be knocked over, but power poles and towers can break and fall as well. Although all weather-related outages cannot be prevented, vegetation management definitely minimizes damage, injury and outages.

Reducing the likelihood for power outages

Several years ago, we developed a plan to thoroughly cut one section each year, while going back and hitting the trouble spots every three years. We are coming to the end of the sixth year of this program, and will soon start over on the first section. Although kudzu may grow faster than that, we have found this schedule to be the best formula for our system. 

This strategic, cycle-based approach has been extremely successful. When storms or high winds come through an area, the outages are less severe in those sections recently cut in the ROW program.

And our reliability rate of 99.9% has proved it.   We’re pretty proud of that fact!

From now through the end of the year, ROW contractors will be clearing lines served by the Cottonwood Substation – and spraying under lines served by the Hartford and Slocomb Substations.

In addition to safety concerns and outage prevention, vegetation management is necessary to reduce unexpected costs. By keeping rights of way clear, co-op crews are able to restore power more quickly, improve reliability and prevent expensive repairs to systems damaged by fallen trees or neglected vegetation. 

So while it may not always be pretty, right of way maintenance is absolutely necessary to help us deliver safe, reliable power at the lowest possible cost. 

And that’s just what you expect from your electric utility, isn’t it?