We Energies Burlington substation back online

 

The We Energies Burlington substation is back online after the station flooded during last week's heavy rain. According to We Energies, the repair work was seamless and they did not have to de-energize the system during repairs, and customers shouldn't have noticed any changes in their service.

Crews were able to complete very complicated repairs to the substation, which was submerged in more than two feet of flood water last week, in just three days – much sooner than initially anticipated.

While substation repairs were being completed, Burlington customers had electricity served through mobile transformers. Though no longer necessary, the mobile units remain on site until the nearby Fox River recedes further.

Getting the substation back on line was no small task. More than 50 employees were dedicated to the effort. They had to replace damaged equipment and perform dozens of switching operations in the distribution network.

Unlike the light switches at your home, the switches at the substation are connected to multiple wires so we can reroute power when necessary. These redundancies are built into our system to minimize the impact of outages.

Crews had to perform more than 30 intricate switching operations to connect customers to the mobile transformers. After repairs, they had to perform all those operations again to reconnect customers to the substation.

To minimize stress to the We Energies system during this delicate process, some larger industrial customers in the area agreed to curtail their electric use temporarily.