Clark Public Utilities works hard to keep outages few and far between, and as short as possible when they happen.
In 2018, the average outage experienced by Clark Public Utilities customers was just 35 minutes, compared to the national average outage of 329 minutes (just about five-and-a-half hours), according to data from the American Public Power Association.
Those quick restoration times are the result of years of effort and proactive work and collaboration across departments, but they wouldn’t be possible without a fast-acting and high-performing dispatch center initiating the response.
Dispatchers can see the utility’s entire electrical network from their desks — more than 6,600 miles of electric wire spanning the county — and they monitor it for trouble 24 hours a day, seven days a week. From their workstations they direct line crews and servicemen out into the community for system maintenance and emergency response.
“Being ready, that’s our job,” said Jared Hinton, outage coordinator and project supervisor at Clark Public Utilities.
A certain personality type gravitates toward becoming a dispatcher. To do it well, one must be cool under pressure, able to stay organized in chaotic situations and enjoy working through often complicated circumstances.
“It can be stressful when a major event happens, and, say, something like 30,000 people are suddenly without power, alarms are going off and the phones are ringing off the hook; but it’s also very rewarding to work through a problem and getting the power restored quickly and safely. We definitely take a lot of pride in the work we do,” said Greg Van Fleet, Clark Public Utilities dispatch system operator.
Whether an outage affects one person or a thousand, dispatchers rely on outage reports from PowerLine and the outage reporting tool on the utility’s website to home-in on the problem. Those tools, combined with the dispatcher’s knowledge and training help them narrow down where, in the county’s 656 square miles, the fault may be.
“Customer outage reports are crucial,” Van Fleet said. “If customers don’t tell us, we might not know they’re out of power. The more calls we get, the faster we can locate the issue.”
Once they’ve narrowed the problem down to a specific area, dispatch sends servicemen out to locate and correct the problem. If the issue is too big for one or two people, dispatch will send out a larger and better-equipped line crew to fix it.
In many ways, the dispatch office is the hub of the utility. Those employees work closely with several other departments to communicate important information from planners, engineers and customer service representatives to the line crews and servicemen doing the work throughout the community.
Because the Clark Public Utilities grid is connected to a multistate transmission system, dispatchers also work closely with area utilities such as the Bonneville Power Administration or PacifiCorp. The job requires deep knowledge of the system’s layout and capabilities, as well as an awareness of what’s happening on the ground in real time.
“Whether it’s within our own network or the larger regional network, power supplies and demand must be in a constant balance to keep the system stable,” Hinton said. “As dispatchers, we play a key role in maintaining that balance. We help ensure something happening in one area doesn’t create the risk of an outage elsewhere.”
The dispatchers said customers shouldn’t rely on their neighbors to report an outage. They should always call it in right away.
To report an outage at your home, call PowerLine at 360-992-8000 or by click “report an outage” at clarkpublicutilities.com.
Energy Adviser is produced by Clark Public Utilities and relies on the expertise of utility energy counselors and staff, who provide conservation and energy use information. To contact us call 360-992-3355, email ecod@clarkpud.com or visit www.clarkpublicutilities.com.
