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Our numbers tell a positive story about your electric service reliability – and we’re working to do more

Tampa Electric team members install a recloser.
Tampa Electric team members install a recloser.

When it comes to providing quality electric service for our customers – the power you pay for, which happens to cost 12 percent below the national average – you might think that uninterrupted service 99.9 percent of the time would be good enough.

Not for Tampa Electric. That’s why we’re always striving to find new ways to enhance reliability, and it’s the story behind our latest efforts.

With power pole-mounted devices called reclosers, we’re doing more to stop power interruptions – both momentary “flickers” and longer outages – before they travel “upstream” to more customers. In 2015, we nearly doubled the number of reclosers on Tampa Electric circuits, focusing first on communities that have shown the most frequent momentary power interruptions. Currently, about 13.4 percent of our system’s 755 circuits have reclosers – and the results are clear. Last year’s upgrades alone have reduced the Momentary Average Interruption Frequency Index (MAIFI) for our customers by 9 percent in 2015. An all-time record! In 2016, we’ve budgeted to add even more reclosers to further improve our numbers.

Smaller, similar devices called trip savers, which are better suited to some circuits than reclosers, are also part of our reliability-enhancing efforts, on which we’re spending about $1.3 million in 2016.

In the end, the effort is all about recognizing the natural presence of things that can cause outages and coming up with smart solutions, said Mark Moyer, Operations Engineer with Tampa Electric Plant City and Dade City Operations.

“The Tampa Bay area is fortunate to be ideal for trees of all kinds – which, as a Tree Line USA utility, we trim using methods to protect their health when they grow near electrical infrastructure – but that means that as they brush against power lines, service interruptions are going to happen,” Moyer said. “Despite that reality, we’re committed to limiting those interruptions as much as we can, and the current effort underway is a great move in the right direction.”

In addition to being valuable during hurricane season, TECO’s reliability investments address other factors that cause outages such as smaller storms – and even woodpeckers that can damage power poles. To that end, Tampa Electric is also cycling woodpecker-proof poles into its system.

Moyer said that in addition to a commitment to the community found all across TECO, company team members have a personal stake in efforts to enhance reliability.

“In a lot of cases, we’re Tampa Electric customers too among the more than 720,000 others, and we get frustrated with outages just like everyone,” he said. “It’s extra frustrating when we hear about outages from neighbors! But the company is taking every reasonable step to enhance reliability in balance with other factors, like cost. And when you add it all up, it’s a story we’re proud to tell at the end of the day.”

You have the power to help manage outages! See the ways we make it easier to let us know about outages and get information about them if they happen.

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