PSC: Utility can improve disaster plan w/ Missouri PSC Empire District storm preparedness & restoration report

By Melissa Dunson

mdunson@joplinglobe.com

Members of the Missouri Public Service Commission staff have laid out 25 recommendations for Empire District Electric Co. on how it could have responded better during the historic December 2007 ice storm and how it can help prevent a similar situation to the one that left 65,000 of the local utility’s customers without power for as long as a week.

Many of those recommendations centered on better communication, with the media, its customers, other organizations and even within the company itself. The recently released report also recommends Empire revise its vegetation-management policies and infrastructure standards.

The report was the result of a PSC investigation that started in January and looked into four utility companies, Empire, Ameren, Aquila and Kansas City Power & Light, and their responses to the ice storm. The investigation was prompted by the geographic scope of the damage and the length of time people were without power.

The report concluded that all four utilities did have storm-restoration plans in place and executed them, but all could improve the response.

The PSC received more than 100 public comments during and after the storm regarding Empire’s efforts to restore power.

Empire was not alone in its areas of improvement. Kevin Kelly, PSC spokesman, said improved communication was a need shared by all the utilities. New PSC rules on tree-trimming, infrastructure inspection and service reliability will also go into effect later this summer and could address some of the other problems common to all the utilities examined.

In conjunction with the PSC investigation, Empire conducted its own investigation into its response. Amy Bass, Empire spokeswoman, said Monday she was not surprised by the PSC report’s findings or recommendations, and that Empire is reviewing the document, but is not ready to make any statement about the report or to implement the recommendations.

In its self-analysis included in the PSC’s report, Empire reported that there was significant failure of newer poles, cross arms and wires during the storm because of the weight of the ice. Empire noted the system was just not built to support that amount of weight.

Empire’s analysis said the call center used all available employees as well as volunteers during the ice storm, but was still not able to keep up with the volume of calls. Empire also said its telephone company, AT&T, was having issues at that time that exacerbated the problem. In future incidents, Empire said it will use more messaging capabilities with its customers.

Empire did state in its analysis that recovery time probably would have been reduced if the company had achieved the complete cycle of its tree-trimming policy.

In addition, Bass said Empire has already taken action on several items identified in its internal review, including the addition of the Outage Center on its Web site www.empiredistrict.com.

Kelly said Empire and the other utilities have until Aug. 15 to file a response to the PSC staff’s findings. After that, he said, the decision for implementation will go back to the commission to decide.