Two-minute impact
Aaron Minervine, a service area director for CenterPoint Energy, went before The Woodlands Township board of directors on June 25 to review upgrades the company has made to area systems.
The main upgrades included installing weather-resistant composite poles, clearing hazardous vegetation from power lines and moving utility lines underground where possible, Minervine said.
The other shift is de-centralizing power restoration efforts from CenterPoint’s main operations facility by creating service areas, which allow for more personalized and direct communication with residents and municipalities.
“It's incredibly important that we make sure that we earn the trust from the community,” Minervine said. “We realize that we did not do a good job of fostering that trust, and we failed visibly—not in the fact of how quickly we restored, but in the fact that we're not communicating clearly how to prepare for this.”
What else?
Minervine said CenterPoint Energy is also shifting its focus when it comes to prioritizing outages. While restoring power to “critical infrastructure” such as hospitals and fire departments is still a priority, Minervine said the company is also looking to prioritize residential properties.
“People work from home now, we're very mindful of that,” Minervine said. “We don't want to interrupt the daily flow of work. We don't want to interrupt the daily convenience of everyday life. We understand where we play a role in that, and we're trying desperately to improve it.”
Minervine said the company’s outage tracker has also been overhauled, and it now supports real-time reporting by individuals of debris or fallen lines.
Key takeaways
Minervine said that even with all of the improvements being made for the grid, residents will still more than likely experience “blips” in the system.
“Resilient doesn't mean that you won't see blips,” Minervine said. “There are things that go on in the world that we cannot necessarily control, but we're trying to harden our system. So when we do experience those things ... our ability to recover is much, much faster.”
Board members encouraged further community engagement in areas like the village of Creekside Park, which is primarily served by CenterPoint Energy.
“For years and years, we could not get anyone from CenterPoint [Energy] to come meet with staff,” township board Chair Brad Bailey said. “So having someone like [Minervine] that's over the area is a big thing that we can count on.”
