Daffodils and tulips blooming this month are welcome sights to Buckeye Rural Electric Cooperative members who withstood the coldest winter in a decade to start 2007. An extended period of below-zero temperatures marked February, when BREC sold more power and had fewer load-related outages than at anytime in its 70-year history.

Electric bills climbed as co-op members consumed energy to keep their homes and businesses warm. The good news, however, was that BREC and the Ohio electric cooperatives’ generation and transmission supplier, Buckeye Power, Inc., were able to meet demand.

On Tuesday morning, Feb. 6, BREC set a new system peak of 79 megawatts.

“We really got to see the benefit of our system improvements,” said BREC Operations Manager Marvin Ours.

Evening and morning peak demand periods were largely without load-related outages. The coldest 24-hour stretch, when the mercury plummeted to minus-11 degrees, was marked by only one major outage affecting 863 homes. It happened when a main conductor span sagged too much under load and came in contact with the neutral wire. BREC linemen restored service in an hour.

Patriot substation, serving BREC’s largest concentration of load, cranked out 12.5 megawatts of power on Feb. 6.

“Several of our substations were operating at capacity,” said Ours. “The work we’ve recently done with new tie-lines and back-feeds allowed us to shift load around and avoid possible trouble.”

New substations at Rodney, Milton, and Scottown and the new transformer at Patriot showed their worth, according to Ours.

Also helping was the work completed under the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) disaster restoration project, which repaired and rebuilt parts of the system damaged in the President’s Day ice storm of 2003.

“I’ve seen it in the past when BREC couldn’t keep its lines from burning down under load of this size,” he added. “We have really come a long way, and we are working hard to make things even better for our members.”

Ours said BREC’s goal is to prevent outages before they occur through system strengthening and improved maintenance. Several additional substations are either on the drawing board or ready to be let for bid.

“Our members want and expect more reliable service. Plus, our electric system is growing. It’s really amazing how much things have changed in a short period of time.”

BREC Vice President of Engineering and Planning Jeff Tackett noted that the Feb. 6 peak exceeded last year’s summer peak of record by almost 20 megawatts. He said the fact that BPI did little or no load control means, from an engineering standpoint, “We should re-examine our load forecasts with an eye toward greater winter power sales. The system, in absence of load control measures, needs to be strong enough to handle the demand. ”

He added, “A couple of our substations actually exceeded their transformer ratings on the coldest morning.”

Remembering ‘Brrrrrr!’ February cold was fierce

Almost a week of night-time lows of below zero and daytime highs in the teens marked a February freeze that caused electric bills to spike in Southeastern Ohio. Adding to the discomfort was a blanket of snow that was slow to melt, even under full – but anemic – sunshine.

The net effect on BREC electric bills was higher kilowatt-hour consumption than members had experienced in many years, but as one consumer said, “We had to stay warm and keep the pipes from freezing.” Amazingly, BREC dodged setting a coincidental peak of record, which in the past would have resulted in a penalty. This happened on Jan. 23, 2003, and the co-op’s wholesale power costs soared by almost $1 million for the next year.

“What helped this time was Buckeye Power’s additional peaking plant capacity,” explained Dennis Beard, executive vice president and general manager.

Buckeye Power, Inc. (BPI) is the generation and transmission cooperative owned by Ohio’s electric distribution co-ops. BPI controls all or part of the capacity in several power plants, including the Mone Station, which uses natural gas to fire its jet turbines.

Gas-fired peaking plants operate most efficiently in cold temperature conditions. The Mone Station’s 110 megawatts (MW) of output provided a cushion, allowing BPI to exceed its August, 2006, peak of 1,556 MW on the coldest day of the February freeze.

During the week of Feb. 4, 2007, Ohio electric co-ops used more power than ever before, but the new demand record of 1,618 MW was less painful.

“I think this is an example of excellent power supply planning by BPI,” said Beard. “They only had to do limited load control when temperatures across the state were well below zero.”

In BREC’s service territory, thermometers read from minus-11 to zero for consecutive nights. A week later, temperatures plunged into the teens and single digits in the wake of a winter storm that blasted Ohio.