U.S. electricity watchdog issues first violations
June 5th, 2008 | by admin |LOS ANGELES, June 4 (Reuters) - A U.S. electricityreliability watchdog agency on Wednesday issued the first twofines to two utilities that failed to keep trees clear of powertransmission lines, causing outages last year, said the agency,North American Electric Reliability Corp.
Baltimore Gas & Electric Co and MidAmerican Energy Co wereeach charged with failing to keep vegetation under control tothe point that trees rubbing against big power lines caused thelines to be forced off-line in two separate incidents, NERCsaid.
The August 2003 blackout that affected 50 million people inthe U.S. Northeast and Ontario was caused when trees rubbedagainst big power lines, which in turn caused a cascade ofoutages.
NERC is a self-regulatory organization that is overseen bythe U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The eightnotices of violations against utilities announced on Wednesdaywere the first given by NERC.
Six of the notices to FERC from NERC did not call forfines. FERC must review the fine proposed by NERC againstBaltimore Gas & Electric and MidAmerican Energy.
Rick Sergel, NERC president and chief executive, said morethan half of the 1,400 violation to NERC reliability proceduresthat include a wide range of offenses were self-reported.
Baltimore Gas & Electric reported its own violation and hasaccepted the proposed $180,000 penalty. It admitted it failedto keep trees trimmed to make clear space for a 230-kilovolttransmission line. The line went out of service for a day lastAugust because of the failure of the utility, it admitted.
MidAmerican Energy Co also reported its own violation, NERCsaid, which also caused a one-day outage of a majortransmission line.
A proposed penalty of $75,000 will be assessed for thecompany’s failure last September to keep vegetation clear of a345-kilovolt transmission line from the Cooper NuclearGenerating Plant in Nebraska to the Booneville Substation inDes Moines, Iowa.
MidAmerican Energy is a subsidiary of MidAmerican EnergyHoldings, a Berkshire Hathaway Corp (BRKa.N: Quote, Profile, Research) BERKb.N company. (Reporting by Bernard Woodall; Editing by Christian Wiessner)
