Tennessee Valley Authority
Power Restoration Updates
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May 27, 2011
One month after severe weather moved across the region, TVA continues to repair the damage sustained by the power system.
Dozens of crews (construction, maintenance and contractor support) continue to work to repair damaged transmission facilities.
- Only six transmission lines (two 500 kV lines and four 161 kV lines) remain out of service from a peak of 108.
- The six lines will be repaired over the next four to five weeks as materials become available from the manufacturers. All repairs are expected to be complete by early July.
- Three hundred and three (303) transmission structures have been repaired or replaced, from a total of 353. Fifty (50) still have to be repaired or replaced.
- All connection points have been returned to service. Adequate power supply is expected to be available to meet the forecasted loads. At the peak, 128 customer connections were affected.
Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant is returning to normal operation.
- Unit 2 came online Wednesday morning, May 25.
- Unit 1 came online Thursday morning, May 26.
- At this time, both units are near 100 percent power.
- Unit 3 is expected to return to service next week
Although the transmission system is not fully restored, the transmission system is stable and capable of handling the expected electrical loads. Power outages should only happen as they would under normal operating conditions, such as extreme weather conditions or equipment failures.
All customers who can take power have electrical service. At the peak, almost 850,000 customers were without power in 75 distributor areas.
However, another round of severe storms on May 25-26 caused additional local distribution system damage across a wide area. Distributors in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky reported system damage with more than 135,000 customers without power.
TVA’s Transmission Emergency Operations Center will deactivate today. Field managers will oversee the final transmission system repair work.