WILLMAR -- A faculty underground control wire at the south substation was determined to be the cause of a power outage that interrupted electrical service Jan. 28 to approximately 1,934 Willmar Municipal Utilities customers.
A report on the outage was given to the Municipal Utilities Commission on Monday. The utilities' staff is required to inform the commission of any major service interruption affecting 500 or more customers for one or more hours.
Wes Hompe, staff electrical engineer, prepared a written report on the outage.
He said the wire will be excavated and replaced in the spring.
The outage occurred at 5:42 a.m. Power was gradually restored by 7:10 a.m.
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Hompe said the initial investigation indicated the south substation transformer was knocked out of service due to sudden pressure inside the transformer.
If this happens, the unit must be taken off-line to minimize the possibility of major damage, an explosion or other collateral damage, he said.
Power was restored to customers by back-feeding power from a power plant substation feeder, he said.
In other business, the commission:
- Approved the annual fund balance report for 2007. The utility will have reserves in 10 different funds totaling $16,359,055. Of that amount, $5,553,563 will be reserved at the recommendation of financial advisors to cover three to six months of operating and maintenance costs.
The remaining reserve will cover bond payments, projects, improvements and catastrophic events not funded from other sources, other financing or unplanned costs.
- Held a closed meeting to discuss the status of labor negotiations.
