Essex- we are not alone with our questions
Late 2020 a delegation from ELK Energy appeared as a delegate at the Town of Kingsville, November 23, 2020.
“CFO M. Danelon and Operations Manager N. MacAulay provided an update regarding E.L.K. Energy Inc. operations, capital assets, investment and infrastructure. Dr. Lydia Miljan, E.L.K. Energy Inc. Board representative was also in attendance.”
Mark Danelon gave a very similar speech to the one I posted on my website where I posted: ELK at Lakeshore Council.
Around the 54 minute mark the conversation with the councillors starts. Please note this is not word for word. Please watch the original video for the complete conversation.
Mayor Nelson Santos: Thank you for the presentation and updates. It has been awhile since we have had a representative from ELK. Certainly good to see you in your service territory.
Councillor Laura Lucier: Thank you for being here and I hope you can answer some questions. I am sure I am not alone as a councillor I get a lot of concerns raised by residents and businesses in the Town of Kingsville. Do you have an data on the number of outages and can you speak to some of causes of those outages?
Mark Danelon : I currently do not have specific data for the number of outages but I can speak to the causes. ELK is a distributer embedded in Hydro One territory. So the causes can be two fold, in ELK territory or a supply issue in Hydro One. Over the past year there actually have not been a significant amount of outages in the Kingsville area. What you may be seeing is momentary outages like a flicker lasting one or two minutes. There are many reasons why momentary outages happen. Animals are migrating, weather related. Significantly high winds, wind, lightening and tree contact could all be reasons for momentary or prolonged outages.
Councillor Laura Lucier: Thank you for explaining that. I do think the flickers are something that is causing concerns. Recognizing for businesses at a point of sale for businesses machines have to be reset and flickers are continuous throughout the day and people working from home when those outages occur or flickers the amount of distribution and harm and damages what is being done to make our hydro connections more secure and more reliable?
Mark Danelon: Again, as I previous mentioned safety and reliability are important to us in our service territory. We are increasing our tree trimming and increasing our infrared scans, we always communicate with Hydro One. Now when momentaries happen we encourage our customers to call the office to notify us when there is and our email is customerservice@elkenergy.com so we can investigate those outages . I have not heard of significant issues in regards to the Kingsville service area as of late. The data that I went through prior to the meeting, some of those are out of control of ELK.
Councillor Laura Lucier: Thank you for those explanations. one of the things you mentioned is that we should call your office when there is an outages. I have personally called your office on numerous occasions and the service is not fantastic and the answers are not readily available. I do get a lot better response when I call Hydro One. Is that something you can improve on?
Mark Danelon: Absolutely. I can provide you with my direct extension as well. It may be a timing difference where we do not have that data as well. Our crews are onsite it is all site specific. It all depends on the specific scenario.
Councillor Thomas Neufeld: Is it common practice to notify the municipality when you are doing work in that municipality say underground work?
Mark Danelon: Thank you Councillo,r last meeting ELK along with Kingsville Administration ELK began discussions on the right of way dialogue and we are currently discussing with administration some of those key points.
Councillor Thomas Neufeld: I want to highlight an issue on main street East where a sidewalk was blocked for days on end with no warning to the municipality and any of our residents and it creates a liability issue. I am sure you guys can understand that and we just don’t want that to happen again. I am hoping that it was stressed that when work continues that all parties are aware and everything is kosher. Does that make sense?
Mark Danelon: Yes, again just late last week we have begun the discussion to try to understand both parties sides and we will be in further communication in the next few weeks.
Councillor Thomas Neufeld: Thank you very much, I just hope that was communicated properly.
Deputy Mayor Gord Queen: Thank you Mayor Santos and I certainly appreciate the question Councillor Neufeld just asked and I certainly appreciate that you have done some transformer changes, padmount transformers. For example in the Augustine subdivision and here again when you did that you had to do some primary work you’ve articulated that as well and yet the trailer that was left on the road, we had to how should I say this, encourage it to be moved even after it had a flat tire and blocked residents in the area. Another example where it is nice for the town to know exactly what’s going on and where. I’m speaking from experience for example, we used to have to deal with MTC , when we wanted to do work on the lands that were owned by the province provincial highways I dealt with MTC office when I wanted to get approval because approval was required. I have also worked with the City of London when we wanted to do work on certain roads. Certainly I do appreciate the fact that yes you had the right to do certain things but we want to work with you as opposed to against you to get better service for our residents.
Mayor Nelson Santos: Is there a response to that Mark you want to provide? We’re good. Councillor Deyong.
Councillor Kim Deyong: Thank you Mr. Mayor, through to Mr. Danelon and thank you for being here tonight we certainly have looked forward to you coming to the table and I hope that you know we can see you a little more often than has happened so far, especially given that you’re doing this as asset assessment. I think the public will be interested in knowing the outcome of that. I have a couple questions, one of them is one Councillor Lucier touched on it with is flickering’s. I happen to live in Hydro one territory so I don’t have a flickering out here I hear about it in an elk territory so I do think that maybe there’s a power quality issue and that hopefully your asset assessment will probably be point out some things I need to be addressed to stop that because flickering it isn’t acceptable to say it is a regular part of the process when there’s other service providers who don’t have it and ultimately it is damaged electronics and people equipment and people are investing in surge protectors in what seems to be a power quality issue. The more of a comment. I will get right to my question. Can you comment on anything in terms of supplying power to greenhouses and how that is going to impact services.
Norm MacAulay ( from ELK): With respect to regional planning the bulk of the regional planning process is around growth in the greenhouses. There is currently public forums out to deal with the expansion. Two new transmission stations are being built out in Lakeshore. The additional need for capacity for the greenhouses and the companies being connected all systems are running at capacity or beyond in order to make connections. The majority of the plans for growth in the regional energy plan start in 2021- 2028 for capacity growth so there is a large window or time the system is run at capacity, this is beyond control of ELK and Hydro One as it is managed by the Independent electricity system operator.
Councillor Kim Deyong: In terms of then the interruptions the public are receiving is that because we are running at over capacity? Maybe we will receive some reprieve in 2021- 2024 is that a realistic assumption?
Norm MacAulay: That is always the potential. The longer and longer the feeders in order to get to the customers the more exposure you have for accidents. Yes, there should be some reprieve at the end. How much is happening today because of the need for capacity is not definitive, again is you are running at over capacity and overextending your system you going to be exposed to some inconvenience to it.
Councillor Patterson: I appreciate Mr. Danelon for coming in and taking it on the chin. Thank you everybody has been trying to work with ELK. Couple questions that Councillor Lucier brought to your attention as council we seem to get that a lot. Our seniors are getting bothered it is a real nuisance for them. Where I am experiencing most of my calls from behind the firehall. After hearing what you have told us today I am going to talk to the residents and get some times and dates. it sounds like its just momentarily flickering. If we can get some flicker fluid in there that should help. We would put together a package of times and dates and we will get it off to your office. If I may ask one more questions. ELK does not do locates on service wires when a general locate goes out. Who does a locate for a hydro light?
Norm MacAulay: You mean a streetlight service wire? The streetlights are a municipal asset so ELK does not locate.
Councillor Larry Patterson: Does ELK provide a refresher course for municipalities?
Norm MacAulay: This is not something the ELK is interested in providing. The Health and Safety Organization provides training and locater manufactures.
Councillor Tony Gaffan: Since we are over capacity how does that affect the approvals of all our new builds?
Mark Danelon: No it does not. If it is a residential subdivision for example, the information comes to our operations department. What Norm was saying throughout the entire grid we are nearing capacity that does not mean we can connect 1-2 -15 new houses and it would create a significant issue.
Councillor Tony Gaffan: I have been working in downtown Kingsville for 33 years and and we have been noticing in the downtown the flickering and the service has definitely increased. We have had enough business owners that can show you the data compared to before and after. I would at least hope that we are the customer that the person providing the service would not have the tax payers and the business owners having to search. It is very difficult being a councillor at a barber shop where people call and I have to go search. I get that we may not be able to control the flickering from squirrels or whatever may be. You need to start putting that out as soon as possible especially if it is a transformer and it is going to be out for a certain amount of time. I have gone to the website and the information is not out for sometimes a half and hour. At least if you get the information out to the municipality saying this sector is out and it will be this amount of time. Wondering if we can get that worked on in the future say 2021. Where the information gets out to the public where they can take care of whatever they need to do at home and with their businesses.
Mark Danelon: ELK is looking at how to get information out to the public. We have introduced twitter, I understand your concern about the time lag. Over the past year we have made some modifications to how we post so the time lags should not be so significant. We have linked our twitter to our website. All people have to do is go to our website and all the information regarding outages is there. With prolonger or planned we attempt to contact the customer, notifying them with the exact date and times. We are looking into the future to expand of other methods of technolgy to be identified in a real way.
Councillor Kim Deyong: We have our Director online wondering if she wants to say something?
Director Lydia Miljan: I have been on the ELK Board this term and it has been a learning experience and a lot of issues discussed have been brought up at the Board level. Wondering Mark if you could clarify one point because I recall we discussed greenhouse expansion, part from the province was that we should expect more interruptions until that is done.
Mark Danelon : Norn touched on that, as capacity is reaching its point the grid is taxed and less reliable.
Director Lydia Miljan: To clarify when is this expected to be done?
Mark Danelon: 2021-2024 is the current time frame.
Director Lydia Miljan: So we should let our residents know that we need to be aware that these are the limitations of the utility and it is going to be another 5 years. That has been brought home to me that we are a rural municipality we have a lot of kms of grid to get through and we have increased construction and animal activity so we are more vulnerable that say a bigger city might be.
Mayor Nelson Santos: Certainly the history of energy in our area and look at the maps of transformer station the south half of Essex County, it could of been argued we are underserviced for decades. A former director myself along with Gord Queen, we are aware of those pressures and concerns. As the Southern part of Essex county was growing we saw no investment, all the transformer stations expansions were in Lauzon and in the Northern part of Essex County. Trying to draw capacity our way was a challenge. Now we are seeing reinvestment in the region to relieve the pressure off our Kingsville Transfer station. The reinforcement of the transmission lines and the new station in Leamington Based on the service that you do draw from the Kingsville transfer station is that level improving to transfer power to your areas, Cottam , Kingsville, Harrow and is there a concern with all the work Hydro One has done to their lines is there a concern with ELK’s distribution that it has not been brought up to the same degree? When can we anticipate that happening to some of our lines?
Norm MacAulay: I believe your first question are we getting adequate power now from Hydro One with the work that is happening? We do have adequate capacity coming into us, we have to complete an application annually for load profile. The second part of your question, the overall system in ELK’s plant is not taxed to capacity, we are only using 20-50 percent of the capacity of our line can handle. The overall picture, any additional significant capacity is already allocated out 2022-2024 of all of the stations. The greater build is that we are placing transformer stations and we are building great lengths to get to the loads. We are looking to support Kingsville coming out of Windsor which would give us greater liability. I am looking at the whole southern shore is left isolate for any potential growth. Going back to a councillors comment since you sold shares the transformer station has expanded another 7-8 -10 kms which can impact us, more exposure.
Mayor Nelson Santos: How do we strengthen the reliability along our service centers, businesses main street Cottam, main street Kingsville. I am sure you have had reports of malfunctions, freezers etc. Is there an ability to work with your customers to prevent and support those in the community and protect them. Is there a community plan your Directors can put together, whether it is a flicker of short term outages How can you strengthen the relationship with customers overall.
Norm MacAuley: The flickers are preventing a prolonger outages, it is an automatic reset. It may be annoying but it prevents a long outages. It is a self healing part of the system. We could look into doing some community work. We are working with Hydro One and we are chasing some substantial momentaries coming out of different station supplying different service areas. Predominantly we are not the cuase but it has not been easy getting them to the table. One cause was a faulty set of rosters. The Harrow area is experiencing a significant amount again but it isn’t always us. We are not always the root cause, we need to work with our partner, the two of us.
Mayor Nelson Santos: We can probably have dialogue all night long. We certainly relay on the big responsibly you have. Your operations/capital strategy is there a method of identifying capital.
Norm MacAulay: When the asset condition is done age becomes part of it. Looking at higher risk of failure areas. We are having some issues with some poles we identify and focus more on that area. Aside from that we have gone to a standardized testing program. Connectrics have historical data with is why the OEB gives them guidelines.
Mayor Nelson Santos: Thank you, I figured you would be hosting a number of potential public forums similar to how Hydro One is with their plan. To help and assist with your communications plan we would be happy to assist we would be more than happy to help with that. I appreciate you coming to council tonight to provide information.
Mark Danelon: Thank you very much I do appreciate that.
https://calendar.kingsville.ca/council/Detail/2020-11-23-1830-Regular-Council-Meeting