Tested By Nature, Built to Endure
The year 2025 brought interesting challenges to Yellowstone Valley Electric Cooperative (YVEC). It seems as though we were playing defense most of the time. From June to December, we hustled to repair a plethora of damage caused by a variety of significant storms. Extreme thunderstorms that brought violent winds and hail measured in feet, like snow, during the summer.
This wreaked havoc on our transmission system, causing YVEC to lose miles of transmission line in several locations. Recently, in December, we saw sustained winds of 70+ miles per hour that once again damaged our system in a handful of locations, requiring our employees to work quickly to restore service as soon as possible.
It may sound odd to say that the integrity of our system is quite good. None of the above-mentioned damaged areas had poles or equipment that were dilapidated or in immediate need of upgrade. Forces of nature just won out in those locations. In fact, I believe grid resiliency in our area remains strong.
Resiliency is many things. It’s the reliability of your service, our ability to efficiently restore your power, and being able to meet the demands of new technology. It is how we serve you with various sources of power generation without skipping a beat. Ultimately, resilience is how we deliver our promise to provide reliable, affordable power and to improve the quality of life for our members.
When it comes to having a resilient electric grid, it begins with a system that is designed and built to withstand high winds, powerful storms, cybersecurity threats, and many other disruptions that could result in power outages. A resilient grid is also flexible and adaptable by allowing different types of generation – such as wind, coal, solar, natural gas, and hydro to seamlessly work together to provide you with safe and reliable electricity. The way our local electric system reacts to our growth, the advancements in technology, and the always-increasing need for more power all factor into the resilience of YVEC’s grid.
Resiliency is a 24-hour, 7-day-a-week, 365-day-a-year task. Whether it’s the power lines, substations, or generation on our grid, it takes proactive maintenance and proactive investments in upgrades to keep the entire system running smoothly. YVEC, over its last 3 construction work plans, which span the last 12 years, has invested about $50,000,000 in substation upgrades, main feeder line re-conductors, and new transmission line feeds. Our latest work plan, which was reviewed and approved by the Board of Trustees, is 4 years and $26,000,000.
This has positioned us well for our continued growth and has also dramatically increased the integrity of our system. With thousands of consumers out of power for months in Puerto Rico, the lack of resiliency was not caused solely by hurricane damage. Yes, obviously, the hurricane was the major contributing factor, but the years of neglect in taking care of their system and the lack of preparation for a worst-case scenario have vastly exacerbated the problems in Puerto Rico.
In a similar way to how we maintain our vehicles with regular oil changes, inspections, and tire rotations, a grid must also be properly maintained. Throughout the year, YVEC regularly conducts pole and line inspections, inspects substations, and changes out old or aging hardware. Our goal is to find a problem and fix it before it becomes one. For example, if we find a weak pole due to age or damage, we do not try to come up with a way to reinforce that pole; we simply replace it. Doing so ensures that the pole is strong – or as resilient – as it can be.
Living in Montana, we know that significant power outages can occur, especially in the summer storm season and winter conditions. Whether we are at the mercy of thunderstorms or blizzards, we have confidence in the resiliency of our system to recover from the situation with as little disruption as possible.
In the dictionary, resilience is defined as “the ability to bounce back, recover quickly, and go back into shape after being stretched.” When it comes to providing our members with resilient service, that is what we work toward – day in and day out!
Brandon J. Wittman
Chief Executive Officer