On Saturday, March 12, all of Fort Irwin will undergo a power outage, as its primary electricity provider, Southern California Edison, will upgrade its power grid from 6 am to 6 pm. During the outage, SCE will do maintenance work on its power grid.
Those who were here more than two and a half years ago probably have stories to tell of the summer of 2013, when an SCE power line fell on July 22. This caused several major outages, especially after the "100-year storm" that flooded many parts of Fort Irwin on August 13. Since then, SCE has replaced three wood poles with steel poles and plans to replace another 52 poles. SCE has also reinforced and installed additional guide wires on poles in areas prone to flooding.
At Fort Irwin, the Army has purchased an additional 21 portable generators that can be deployed to power up critical facilities during outages. Seven additional building have been outfitted with manual transfer switches and generator hookups to connect to backup generators.
ELECTRIC POWER QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Fort Irwin Directorate of Public Works (DPW) utilities engineer Chris Sayre and resource efficiency manager Hossam Kassab provided and reviewed the answers below.
How are scheduled power outages determined?
Fort Irwin DPW tries to schedule two major outages a year, one in the spring, and one in the fall, so that power line poles, lines, switching stations, and transformers can be safely and efficiently repaired or replaced. Scheduling can be complicated. SCE proposes outage dates to Fort Irwin, based on field surveys that they conduct to check their power lines, poles, and transformers for age, wear and tear. Work on specific power lines and equipment are prioritized and completed to prevent unplanned outages in the future.
Fort Irwin reviews the dates to ensure they doesn't seriously interfere with garrison operations and NTC training schedules. The best times are in the fall and spring, when the temperature is not too cold or too warm. Last year, the major planned outage for the fall was cancelled, because the proposed date conflicted with the NTC training rotation schedule.
What causes power outages?
A traffic accident could bring down a pole and cause a line break. But "age, wear and tear" is the more common factor, especially because of the climate extremes of the High Desert. Also, when lights blink and go out during a thunderstorm, power surging through the grid further strains the power supply chain that can later prematurely break at any point.
What does SCE have to do with power outages on Fort Irwin?
A lot. While Fort Irwin is working on several ways to reduce its dependence on SCE, SCE normally provides the installation almost 100% of its electricity to run the hospital, restaurants, and housing units. Fort Irwin is an SCE industrial consumer, so the garrison (the Army) pays one monthly bill to SCE. The bill ranges from $1.7 million during the summer months for 25.9 Megawatt hours of electricity a month, to a low of about $631,000 during the spring or fall months, for about 13.2 Megawatt hours a month.
SCE is responsible for providing electricity and maintaining the transmission grid and power lines that ultimately channels electrical power to Fort Irwin through a single, lateral 115 KV line that feeds off a major power transmission corridor between Las Vegas and Southern California.
Who else may be responsible for power outages?
Once the power line reaches Fort Irwin, the electrical current is split through transformer substations and distributed to users across the installation. SCE maintains the power poles, underground conduits and legacy buried cables, all the way up to a building weather head, meter socket or main disconnect. From there, the Army or the Residential Communities Initiative and its private partners are responsible for the last hundred or more feet going into the wall outlets in the buildings.
Understanding the Grid (U.S. Department of Energy)
http://energy.gov/articles/infographic-understanding-grid
Why does it take so long to get power restored after an unplanned outage?
The electrical grid is complex, with many links in hundreds of miles in the electrical power supply chain, starting from the generator plant, through transmission towers, transformers, power lines, more transformers, and "the last mile" of above-ground and below-ground lines that connects the buildings to the power grid.
Who is responsible for a repair job depends on where the line is broken. How long it takes depends on whether it's a major or minor repair, and availability of repair parts, and availability of construction crews and equipment
SCE's closest maintenance crews work out of its Barstow field office near WalMart. At night, their on-call crew keep their trucks at home. When a call comes in, they can climb into their trucks and log onto their computer to test certain circuits to isolate a problem. But getting to the line break takes time. For safety reasons, they have to assemble a team of three to five linesmen, before they roll out to Fort Irwin. This may take two hours from the time the call is made. Also, if there are several line breaks in their area of operations, like when a major thunderstorm hits the region, SCE must prioritize where they go first.
Another problem is that certain parts may not be in the Barstow area and may need to be shipped in. SCE has now increased its stockpile of power line poles in Barstow. It has also been offered a place to store poles and equipment on Fort Irwin. Two years ago, a replacement pole had to be trucked in from the Palmdale area and required special permits and escorts, due to the pole's length, to replace a downed pole that caused the major outages on Fort Irwin.
What other factors affect electrical usage?
Fort Irwin is part of the SCE's southern California power grid. When unusually hot and humid weather hits the region, the millions of air conditioning and cooler units that feed off the Southern California power grid eat up a lot more energy.
This past summer, between July 1 and Sept. 11, Fort Irwin residents and employees were asked on eight different days, to set their thermostat to 78 degrees, and to turn off lights, computers, and printers not in use. Residents were asked to delay using washers and dryers between late morning and 8 pm. The less electricity Fort Irwin uses during such times, the less extra electricity SCE has to provide Fort Irwin. It can then send more to other customers on its power grid. That savings is passed on to power bill payers on Fort Irwin.
If you're a homeowner getting SCE power, you can sign up for SCE's Summer Discount Plan to reduce your electrical bill.
https://www.sce.com/wps/wcm/connect/1114de14-c46e-4921-bf16-b88a5ac6610a/SDP+FACT+Sheet+NR-587-V6-0413.pdf?MOD=AJPERES
The garrison, as the bill payer for all of Fort Irwin, has a slightly different program as an industrial user.
How are the meters used on central air conditioning units in RCI (Residential Communities Initiative) housing?
Fort Irwin housing is included in the SCE discount plan, through RCI and the contractor managing the residential units. In 2002 and 2003, small cycling devices were installed on housing central air conditioning units. Last year was the first year that the program was being used extensively. SCE can remotely turn off and on the compressor of these cooling units for 15 minutes each half hour, up to a total maximum of 6 hours a day. Most people don't notice it, because the fan is still blowing out air, although the air isn't being cooled. It may get slightly warmer during that time, but the compressor then kicks in, to cool the air until the next turn-off cycle. Less energy used at lower cost results in a lower electrical bills to residents.
How about wind power?
While strong winds sometimes blow on Fort Irwin, it is not constant enough to be efficient. Wind turbines also can interfere with wireless communication systems. In any case, and as with solar power, the large challenge being worked on by scientists and engineers around the world is to develop efficient energy storage systems, so power can be accessed 24-7 in all kinds of weather. Right now, storing just 1 Megawatt hour of electricity would require acquiring and maintaining a battery the size of a 40-foot shipping container box.
Also, right now, if the power from the SCE grid goes out, the solar power units on Fort Irwin shut off automatically, as a safety factor. When SCE restores power, the solar power systems stays off for about five minutes, to ensure they can safely be turned on. If the solar panels are independent of the SCE grid, they would require their own stand-by generators and power systems.
Is Fort Irwin working to reduce its dependence on SCE for its electrical power?
The short and long answers are yes. Fort Irwin is beginning to use more alternate energy sources, especially solar power. Still, while alternate energy technology has grown rapidly in recent years, getting most of our power from SCE is still cheaper and more reliable than generating it on Fort Irwin.
Fort Irwin uses an average of about 10 Megawatt/hours of power. In the summer, usage climbs to 26 Megawatts and up to 30+ Megawatts during peak periods.
Short term, you may have notice that many solar panels are already mounted on street lights, foot paths, and roofs of large parking garages. These convert solar energy directly to electrical energy, but are not very efficient, so they are most cost-effective in isolated areas and storing the power in small batteries for later use.
Fort Irwin is already or will soon get its electrical power from other renewable energy sources on Fort Irwin:
• Concentrated photo-voltaic solar farm. This 1-Megawatt pilot plant on Goldstone Road has movable panels that follow the sun for maximum efficiency and concentrate the solar energy onto the energy conversion cells. It has been operational since July 2015.
• Hospital solar-voltaic power plant. The new Weed Army Community Hospital now under construction on North (Outer) Loop Road will have a large solar farm next to it to provide the hospital with 2.4 Megawatts, 100 % of its projected daily average consumption. The rooftop of the new hospital will also have a solar thermal system to heat water for washing and cleaning.
• Waste to energy plant. A privately constructed waste to energy plant at the north end of 5th Street is expected to become operational later this year. It will take Fort Irwin's municipal waste and convert it into a synthetic natural gas as the energy source to generate 1-2 Megawatt hours of electricity, while reducing the waste to about 15% of its former volume.
• Photo-voltaic solar farm outside front gate. In the works is another photo-voltaic solar farm outside our front gate, a 15 megawatt farm over 150 acres. This project is still under review by the Army Office of Energy Initiative.
• Direct Digital Control. By this summer, most of Fort Irwin facilities will be equipped with direct digital control, a standard computerized, facility management system that senses in real time, the air temperature inside and outside buildings, and adjust heating, ventilation, and air conditioning units to standards set by the Army.
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