Work continues to upgrade Fort McCoy’s power grid to Wye Electrical System

Fort McCoy’s Directorate of Public Works (DPW) and Xcel Energy continue to work together to finish the process of changing the electrical grid on post from a Delta Electrical System to a Wye Electrical System, Fort McCoy DPW officials said.

Work on this switchover has been ongoing since 2022, officials said, and during November and December 2025, workers continued to work on the project.

Wye is a three-phase electrical system that uses a wire for each electrical leg and a separate neutral wire.

Delta is also a three-phase but uses one of the legs as the neutral, so it only has three wires. Work will continue throughout the year.

At the website, https://electricityforum.com, a comparison between Wye and Delta was made. It discussed some of the benefits of the Wye system.

“Wye connections, with their neutral point, are common in low-voltage distribution systems, allowing for single-phase loads to be connected alongside three-phase loads,” the website states. “Wye connections provide the flexibility of both line-to-line and line-to-neutral voltages.”

Brandon Gronau, engineering technician with the Fort McCoy Directorate of Public Works Energy Branch, discussed the ongoing work in a previous news article.

“We — Fort McCoy and Xcel — are in the process of changing from a Delta Electrical System to a Wye Electrical System,” Gronau said. “The basics of that is just how the system is wired. Wye is a three-phase electrical system that uses a wire for each electrical leg and a separate neutral wire. Delta is also a three-phase but uses one of the legs as the neutral, so it only has three wires.”

Gronau said Xcel wanted to do this because they are the installation’s electrical privatization contractor, and they own all of the electrical infrastructure on post. Work has been steady for nearly since it started.

“Delta can be an unreliable system and is outdated,” Gronau said. “We were the only Delta system that Xcel has in the state, so in order to standardize all of their equipment they made the decision to change us over, too.”

Gronau said the switch is about resiliency in the system at Fort McCoy.

“Because Xcel is changing everything anyway, we decided that we wanted to move all of our overhead electrical that is inside the cantonment area underground as part of our move to making Fort McCoy more energy resilient,” Gronau said at the start of the switchover. “So, it just makes sense to do it all at the same time. We opted to only do the cantonment area, so they were replacing the poles on South Post to upgrade the infrastructure to support the change.”

According to the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Management at https://www.asaie.army.mil/Energy_and_Sustainability, projects like this are important for not just Fort McCoy’s future but the Army as well.

“Secure and reliable access to energy and water is essential to ensuring that the Total Army is ready to deploy, fight, and win across the entire spectrum of conflict,” the website states. “The Army’s Energy and Sustainability programs, to include installation and operational energy, support the Army’s priorities of readiness, modernization, reform, and alliances and partnerships.

“Army installations, where our Soldiers live, train, and deploy from, must have assured access to energy and water to enhance mission readiness,” the website states. “In order to be prepared to conduct operations both today and in the future, the Army is integrating energy and water considerations across the enterprise by focusing on resilience, efficiency, and affordability.”

Fort McCoy’s motto is to be the “Total Force Training Center.”

Located in the heart of the upper Midwest, Fort McCoy is the only U.S. Army installation in Wisconsin.

The installation has provided support and facilities for the field and classroom training of more than 100,000 military personnel from all services nearly every year since 1984.

Learn more about Fort McCoy online at https://home.army.mil/mccoy, on Facebook by searching “ftmccoy,” on Flickr at https://www.flickr.com/photos/fortmccoywi, and on X (formerly Twitter) by searching “usagmccoy.”

Also try downloading the My Army Post app to your smartphone and set “Fort McCoy” or another installation as your preferred base. Fort McCoy is also part of Army’s Installation Management Command where “We Are The Army’s Home.”