Related News
Related News
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EWEB customers achieve remarkable results in environmental stewardship through EWEB's Lead Green programs
Subscribers of EWEB's Lead Green programs helped reduce carbon emissions in 2023 by 730 metric tons of CO2e.
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EWEB prepares to re-energize the new Currin Substation
The rebuilt substation will increase load capacity, improve power reliability, and incorporate seismic resiliency to ensure service to our community for generations.
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EWEB, SUB and RWD join forces at Lane County Fair to distribute water to fairgoers
The Eugene Water & Electric Board, Springfield Utility Board and Rainbow Water District are teaming up for the 9th year to provide fairgoers with clean, cold free water.
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Demand for EWEB electricity during heatwave nearly broke all-time summer record
Climate-driven weather extremes, home electrification, high-tech manufacturing and data centers will cause electricity demand to surge across the Pacific Northwest.
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EWEB explores rate increases to cover rising costs and to modernize infrastructure
Amid rising inflation and other challenges, rate increases are necessary to maintain reliable utility services and fund critical investments in Eugene’s water and electric infrastructure.
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EWEB prepares for rising energy demand as weekend heat wave arrives
Electricity supply is sufficient for now, but new supplies will be necessary in the years ahead to keep pace.
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EWEB preparing for expected surge in electric vehicles
Electric vehicle (EV) sales are poised to skyrocket in the years ahead as technology improves, more models hit the market, prices fall and regulations limit the sale of gas-powered vehicles. And EWEB is preparing for this surge.
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Community members can test out climate-friendly e-bikes at E-Bike Expo on Saturday
EWEB encourages Eugene residents to ride into summer on clean, accessible e-bikes, with a $300 e-bike rebate.
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EWEB invests in satellite-based forestry analytics for vegetation management
EWEB maintains over 1,300 miles of overhead transmission and distribution lines. To aid crews in identifying hazardous vegetation growth in a sometimes heavily forested service territory, EWEB is utilizing a new satellite-based forestry analytics software called Overstory.
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Tips to stay cool while saving money this summer
June is quickly approaching, and that means summer weather is just around the corner. Before you turn up the air conditioning and see an increase in your utility bill, try these tips to prepare your home for warmer weather to keep your home cool.
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EWEB offering additional energy efficiency supplement to qualified customers
Current EWEB residential electric customers may qualify to double their energy efficiency rebates with a limited time supplement.
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EWEB opens application for 2024 Electric Mobility Community Grants
Grant awards of up to $30,000 to cover costs associated with electric mobility projects.
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Upgrades to Eugene's downtown electric network continue
You may have noticed construction this week on the corner of 7th and Pearl Street. That’s because crews replaced a corroded, aging vault with an innovative, new Voltek vault. The Voltek design allows for the new infrastructure to be built inside of the existing aging vault. We’re able to install the new vault while the cables are still energized, minimizing disruption to customers and traffic while cutting construction time in half.
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The Big Freeze 2024: After Action Report
Winter 2024 was one for the records books, and we'll look back on it for years to come and say, "That was a doozy!" The back-to-back January Ice Storms caused widespread damage to EWEB’s service territory, affecting approximately 38,000 customers. Preliminary repair costs were over $8 million, and additional repairs to transmission lines are still required.
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New tanks come online as EWEB modernizes water system
New drinking water storage tanks are one of several investments to ensure that EWEB can meet critical community needs in the event of an earthquake.
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Substations – The resilient spine of EWEB’s electric system
July 27, 2023 • Robyn Smith, EWEB Communications
“The resilience of the distribution system is based on three elements: damage prevention, system recovery, and functional survivability.” – Electric Power Research Institute
Thirty-eight substations, often called EWEB's "resilient spine," connect the utility's electric grid. The redundancy of substations in the system ensures reliable power flows to homes and businesses despite unexpected equipment failures and routine maintenance.
"EWEB's transmission and distribution system sometimes is referred to as overbuilt – but that's simply not true!" said Tyler Nice, EWEB electric operations manager. “When one part fails, we can lean on another part of the system. This is redundancy, not waste. And redundancy makes us more resilient to both small problems and major disasters.”
From the 1960s to the 1980s, Eugene was growing fast as new residents and industries moved to the area. EWEB engineers were challenged to accommodate a rapidly expanding city to keep up with the growing electricity demand. They had the ingenuity and the space to design a grid to accommodate growth and expanded load capacity. They did this by creating a redundant substation system where if one substation or part of the system goes down, another part can pick up the slack on the same electric circuit.
Substations change, or "step down," high voltage electricity from power generation stations to levels that can be safely distributed to homes and businesses. The Currin Substation, near Garden Way and I-5, is under construction, which means the power Currin usually distributes is being distributed from other substations that can temporarily handle the extra load capacity – thanks to the redundant design of EWEB's infrastructure.
"The flexibility provided by EWEB's past design decisions has put us in a good place to accommodate changing demands today, such as electrification and EV adoption," said Nice. "We are unique and lucky in that most other systems at other utilities, serving a similar customer base, are not typically as robust and redundant as ours."
Utility infrastructure is a complex system that requires investment and maintenance to provide constant, reliable power. When electricity is so reliable and accessible with a simple flip of the switch, it can be easy to overlook what it takes to maintain a reliable electric grid.
EWEB tracks electric reliability through metrics like the average duration and frequency of outages. But resiliency is not entirely measurable. Instead, it’s a characteristic of a distribution system that demonstrates incident prevention, recovery, and survivability. The redundancy in EWEB’s system helps the utility recover faster from equipment damage, reduces the occurrence of prolonged outages, and sustains the functional life span of equipment by distributing load capacity between multiple substations when needed.
While EWEB is fortunate to have a system designed for resiliency, the utility must maintain this characteristic to supply reliable power for generations to come. With so much of EWEB's electric infrastructure built around the same time, we have arrived at an aging infrastructure bubble. The equipment installed 50 to 60 years ago during Eugene's building boom is reaching the end of its useful life and no longer meets modern systematic expectations.
Currin is the first of ten substations scheduled for a rebuild over the next ten years as part of EWEB's major infrastructure investments through our Capital Improvement Plan for rehabilitating, replacing, and installing new infrastructure to maintain system resiliency.
We're partnering with you on a reliable future
To ensure a reliable tomorrow, we need to put in the work today, and the rates you pay as an EWEB customer help us do just that. In 2022, for the first time in five years, EWEB's utility rates increased. Rising costs from inflation, near-term supply chain shortages, and the need to upgrade aging infrastructure require an increase in the fees we charge for water and electric services. A percentage of your rates will help fund a new era of distribution infrastructure, providing reliable power for customers for the next half a century and beyond.
Learn more at eweb.org/electricreliability.