Our nation’s electric transmission system is an incredible network that serves us well, despite its age. Bulk power is transmitted at high voltages over long distances from power plants hundreds of miles away to our local substations, where the power is stepped down to a voltage that is safe to power your home.
Both transmission lines and the local distribution lines they supply, despite being the achievements of engineering and technology that they are, require a steady stream of repairs, upgrades, and modernizations to keep things flowing smoothly and support our 21st-century demands. Every time you pay your power bill, some of those hard-earned dollars get passed directly on to our transmission providers to pay for upkeep and needed improvements to the transmission system.
On your next road trip, keep an eye out for transmission lines. You can easily spot them along the interstate corridors in Ohio and elsewhere, as their large metal towers can carry wires up to 200 feet in the air, making them easy to distinguish from our distribution lines, which are on wooden poles along the roads closer to your home. If you look closely, chances are good that you’ll see at least some of those transmission lines in some state of repair, upgrade, or replacement. This work is essential, in part because the age of these systems require it, but also because our modern power systems must increasingly accommodate power from intermittent sources like solar and wind alongside our traditional baseload generation sources like coal, nuclear, and natural gas. But that work does come at a cost that we must all bear, and like so many things in today’s world, those costs continue to rise.
Out of South Central Power’s 12,000 miles of line, 264 are transmission lines, delivering high-voltage power between substations. Of that 264 miles, 142 are targeted to be rebuilt, with 45 miles already completed or scheduled to be completed in the near future. Many of these transmission lines are 70+ years old and by replacing aged wood poles with steel poles of equivalent size and capacity, we will ensure their viability for years to come.
Here’s a look at some recent and planned transmission projects.
Lockbourne/Rickenbacker area
South Central Power recently completed an upgrade and rebuilt more than six miles of 69kV transmission line, as well as the distribution under build. This route was from Lockbourne substation to Midway substation, Rickenbacker substation, and ending at Walnut substation.
Pike & Ross counties
This summer, South Central Power will start a 9-mile rebuild of transmission and distribution lines along State Route 772 from our Ware Road substation to our Summitt Hill substation. This project will continue through 2025.
Lancaster
South Central Power will upgrade our transmission line along Delmont Road and close to the U.S. Route 33 bypass this summer. This project will include upgrading transmission and distribution lines along Delmont Road, which begins at Delmont substation, goes along Crumley Road, through field right-of-way, and ends at Anchor Hocking substation on Collins Road. This 4.3-mile upgrade is scheduled to start this summer and be completed 2025.
Miscellaneous transmission work
South Central Power is doing various transmission upgrades in Lancaster and the surrounding vicinity including these:
- Due to bridge work along State Route 159 outside of Amanda, South Central Power is rerouting and upgrading the transmission lines, as well as prepping for the future rebuild of the Delmont substation to Amanda substation line in 2025.
- In Perry County, on County Road 26, South Central Power is rerouting transmission for an upcoming bridge replacement.
- To support the high-speed relaying work that is scheduled for this summer, South Central Power will be installing fiber-optic cabling on 40 miles of transmission line in 2024. This is the first phase of a four- to five-year project that will increase reliability and reduce outage and switching time across the central region from Rickenbacker south to Chillicothe and west to Lancaster. Our goal will be to size the fiberoptic lines such that we will have the option of offering fiber internet to members in portions of these areas.
From the August 2024 issue of Ohio Cooperative Living.