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12/16/2011
VELCO Right of Way Management
Where We Were, Where We Are, and Where We are Headed
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Major Responsibilities of Right of Way Management Team
• Vegetation Management – Ensure no vegetation caused outages – Ensure compliance with NERC FAC-003-1 – Ensure compliance with all PSB rules – Ensure compliance with herbicide permitting
• Clearing for Capital Construction – Tree Clearing for new lines and substations – Compliance with permitting as it relates to clearing
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Major Responsibilities of Right of Way Management Team
• Access Road Construction – Construct new on and off corridor access roads – Enhance existing on and off corridor access roads
• Access Road Maintenance – Maintain approximately 198 miles
• Aesthetic Mitigation – Over 10,000 trees planted on past projects requiring
annual monitoring and maintenance
• Aerial Patrols – Coordinate all scheduled and emergent aerial patrols
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Right of Way Management
• 732 line miles – 139 mile increase
in miles since 2005 – 23 % increase in
miles since 2005 • 13,000 acres of
right of way – 1577 increase in
acres since 2005 – 14 % increase in
acres since 2005
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The primary goal of the vegetation management program is to ensure the safety and reliability of the transmission system
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NERC FAC- 003-1 Vegetation Management Standard
• Following August 2003 Blackout NERC established FAC-003-1 Vegetation Standard
• Standard applies to all 200kV and above lines – Equates to 250 of the 732 miles on the VELCO system – Currently need to report all vegetation caused interruptions
to NPCC – NPCC may require 100kV and above lines be applicable to
the standard in the future
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• Vegetation Standard Requirements – R1.Transmission Vegetation Management Plan (TVMP)
• Documented policies, standards, practices, and procedures • Minimum vegetation to conductor clearances • Imminent threat procedures • Mitigation procedures • Personnel qualifications • Vegetation inspection standards
– R2. Annual Work Plans • Vegetation control methods to be used must be specified • Requires documentation that annual work plan completed • Requires documentation of any deviations of work plans
NERC FAC- 003-1 Vegetation Management Standard
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• Vegetation Standard Requirements – R3. Reporting of vegetation caused outages
• Category 1: Grow in outages • Category 2: Fall in from within the right of way • Category 3: Fall in from outside of the right of way
NERC FAC- 003-1 Vegetation Management Standard
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Violations of NERC FAC-003-1
Re: NERC Full Notice of Penalty regarding Metropolitan Edison Company,
The assessed penalty of ($650,000), in addition to other remedies and actions to mitigate
MetEd self-reported a violation of FAC-003-1 Requirement (R) 2 to ReliabilityFirst Corporation
On June 15, 2010, the owner of a residential property called to report observing a ”flash or ball of fire” and a crackling sound (flashover event) near power lines later determined to be MetEd’s 230 kV Transmission Line Number 1074 (Line 1074).
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TVMP VELCO Transmission Vegetation
Management Plan (TVMP) • Four year vegetation management cycle • Uses an Integrated Vegetation Management Program and Industry Best Practices • Follows NERC, NESC, and ANSI standards for Vegetation Management
• On file with NERC, PSB, VT Agency of Natural Resources, and VT Agency of Agriculture
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TVMP
• Goals of TVMP – Safety – Reliability – Environmental Impact
• Wetlands • Erosion Control • Wildlife Habitat • Rare, Threatened, and Endangered Species • Rare and Uncommon Natural Areas • Invasive Species
– Economics – Maintain Access – Public Lands – Aesthetics – Public Outreach and Education – Investigate New Technology
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VEGETATION MANAGEMENT INVENTORY SYSTEM (VIP)
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Benefits of VIP System
•Improve Data for Work Planning, Tracking and Budgeting
•Development of Annual Work Plan for NERC FAC-003-1 Standard
•Clearly Defined Work Scope
• Ability to View Environmental Information
• Ability to GPS ROW Features: Treatment Polygons, Private Wells, Access Roads, Fence Lines, etc…
• Improve the Information Supplied to: Vegetation Contractors and State Agencies
• Quality Assurance of Work Scope
• Improved Compliance with Regulations
• System has been Adopted by Other Departments
• In-House Technical Support
Future of the System
•Vegetation Contractors using VIP
•Reduce Paper Map
•Electronic Reporting of Completed Work
•Electronic Reporting of Herbicide use
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Typical Map Sheet
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Typical Rights-of-Way Treatment Data Sheet
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Vegetation Management Inventory System
System Deployment
• System Live – August 28, 2007
• Cost to Develop – $4,500.00
• Hardware Costs – $22,250.00
• Software Costs – $3,000.00
• Conception to Deployment – 2 Months
Results of Deployment
1 ½ Months to Inventory 100 miles of the VELCO System. Similar to previous years.
c 1700 Acres of Right of Way
c 951 Danger Trees
c 408 Special Trees
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GIS BASED AERIAL PATROL SYSTEM
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Benefits of System
• Improved Accuracy and Consistency of Patrol Notes
• Known Locations Without Keeping Track of Aerial Numbers or Counting Structures
• Very Easy Transfer of Notes of Various Crews
• Patrol Notes Can be Used for Tracking through Completion
• Very Simple to Use and Add Notes on the FLY
• In-House Technical Support
Future of the System
• Patrol Notes will be Used to Show Compliance that an Aerial Patrol was Completed of All Lines
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What is LiDAR? • LiDAR = Light Detection And Ranging • Light pulse emitted at a rate of up to
200,000 pulses per second • Uses a 20° angled lens to scan the
area beneath • Flight speed between 50 and 200
knots • Helicopter flown between 100 and
5000 meters high • Each pulse tagged with a specific GPS
location upon return
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Previous use of lidar at VELCO was limited to survey
information for capital projects (New Line Projects)
• Asset Maintenance was developing a 40 mile 115kV pilot program to gain some experience using lidar for ground clearance, facility ratings and vegetation management.
• NERC Alert for Facility Ratings issued and scope of
project went from 40 miles to the entire VELCO system of 732 miles (115kV to 450 HVDC)
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Lidar data was delivered – Over a million classified vegetation interaction points
• 188 points of interest on all voltage classes, but
mostly 115kV. Many points were in coming year’s planned vegetation maintenance
• Loaded points into VELCO VIP as a GIS Layer
and used an Excel spreadsheet to track. • Field reviewed all 188 points (month)
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• What we found • None of the points were clearance
2 violations as observed • Needed to learn and understand
information – Brought us to the same old
“haunts” • Sensitive and difficult
landowners • Wildlife crossing • Road crossings • Environmental buffers • Required selectively cleared
areas for aesthetics
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Tracked what we found in Xcel spreadsheet Delivered by Lidar Company
• Items Tracked – Forester that reviewed and date
reviewed – Actual height of vegetation – Clearance as observed – Action taken (remove, crown reduce, side trim) – Assigned to contractor or
completed in house – Completed and final sign off by
forester
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Next Steps – What do we do with all this information? – cleaned up points of interests
• What are the next points when the trees begin to grow again next year?
– Re ran (points) polygons based on larger thresholds
• 115kV 4’ – 8’ • 230kV 6’ – 10’ • 345kV 10’ – 15’ • 450 HVDC 15’ – 20’
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• “Round 2” Lidar Polygons – Approximately 1200 polygons – Developed GIS layers of polygons into VIP
program – Developed sign off reporting into VIP program to
track progress
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• “Fall In” Trees – 64,461 Trees could hit the
conductors or come within Clearance 2 distance
– 31,433 trees would actually hit conductors
• VELCO foresters began reviewing “Fall Ins” as developing the 2012 Annual Work Plan Inventory
• Indentified Danger Trees and marked for removal using standard procedures as defined in TVMP
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Advantages of Lidar Use – Another “tool” to aid foresters
in the field to make the appropriate decisions
• Can make decisions based on MAX sag and Sway – not as observed
• Tree heights and interactions with conductors easily viewed in the field
• Can aid in landowner disputes of whether vegetation will impact the line
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Integration of Lidar into Vegetation Management
• Future Use of Lidar for Vegetation Management – Annual lidar survey of lines due for
maintenance the following year • Approximately one quarter of the system per
year
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2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Budget Amount 770,000 1,000,000 1,650,000 1,730,000 1,800,000 2,300,000 2,300,000 2,300,000
0
500,000
1,000,000
1,500,000
2,000,000
2,500,000
YEAR
VEGETATION MANAGEMENT BUDGET
Vegetation Management Budget
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YEAR FOLIAR BASAL CST CUT MOW WIDEN DANGER TREES
1996 $110 $566
1997 $174 $596
1998 $148 $711
1999 $115 $546
2000 $126 $507
2001
2002 $121 $606
2003
2004 $160 $724
2005 $190 $207 $658 $714 $715 $2,103 $142
2006 $247 NONE $806 $698 $720 ? $183
2007 $463 NONE NONE $724 $762 ? $106
2008 $278 NONE NONE $567 $713 $7,867 $180
2009 $306 $236 NONE $710 $703 $7,710 $191
2010 $146 NONE NONE $360 $642 $4,174 $105
Vegetation Management Average Costs Per Acre
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Summary - Most Significant Accomplishments
• Zero Vegetation Related Outages for Last 5 years • Zero PSB 3.6 Rules/Herbicide Permit Violations • Entire Vegetation Management program is on 4 year cycle • Integration of new Technology (VIP, Lidar, Range Finders) • Improved Data (Accurately Defined Work Scopes) • Improved Stakeholder Relationships • Exercising Full Easement Widths • Improved Tracking of Vegetation Management Costs • Quality Control on 100% of Annual Work Plans • Received Many Awards for Habitat Improvement • Tree Line USA Certification Last 5 Years
•
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Thank You!
Thank you !
Jeffrey S. Disorda
• Supervisor of Right of Way Management
• Vermont Electric Power Co., Inc. 366 Pinnacle Ridge Road
Rutland, VT 05701
• Email: [email protected]
• Desk Phone: (802) 770 - 6240
• Cell Phone: (802) 353 - 7006