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Theft From the Co-op Hurts All Members
Tampering with an electric meter, illegally hooking into a power supply and stealing copper from a substation may initially seem like victimless crimes. However, power and copper thieves are committing crimes that not only endanger their lives, but also create hazards for utility personnel, first responders and innocent co-op members. When people try to steal power, they create electrocution hazards that may not be apparent until emergency personnel show up. Then, in an emergency situation when power must be shut off to protect firefighters or others entering a building, there are problems. Lines that are interfered with illegally could still be energized, endangering the lives of these first responders. Your local co-op and ultimately its members also pay for the financial cost of such theft. Apply for a legal connection if you do not already have one. If you know of or suspect that someone may be stealing electricity or illegally tampering with electrical equipment, notify your local authorities and your electric co-op. Copper theft can also endanger lives. Electric co-op properties, including substations and power poles, are common targets for copper thieves. Copper theft also costs utility consumers and can even cause fires and explosions. You can help prevent copper theft: • If you notice anything unusual with electric facilities, such as an open substation gate, hanging wires or open equipment, contact your electric co-op immediately. • If you see suspicious activities near electric facilities, call emergency services or your local co-op. Do not intervene. Allow officials to handle the situation. • If you work in construction, store copper securely, especially overnight or anytime the site is vacant. • Install motion-sensor lights and/or a security system to deter possible thieves. Taking preventive measures and reporting suspicious activity are the best methods to help reduce power and copper theft.
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JUNE 2017
Test Your Knowledge of Power Plants Take a minute and learn about facilities generating electricity in the United States with a fun, easy, short quiz at https://energy.gov/articles/quiz-know-your-power-plants. The data used doesn’t include every power plant in the United States, but it does show all facilities with a combined capacity of more than 1 megawatt. Click through the quiz, see what you know and learn as you go.
Colorado Country Life: Connecting You to Your Co-op For more than 60 years, Colorado’s electric co-ops have connected with you, their member-owners, through this statewide publication, now called Colorado Country Life. Why? It is the most effective and economical way to share information to all members each month. Your power provider is an electric co-op, which means you are a member, not simply a ratepayer. You have a say in who sits on your co-op’s board of directors when you vote at annual meeting time; you have the opportunity to vote for board members who represent you. That makes it important for you to know and understand what is happening at the co-op. And that makes Colorado
Country Life an important magazine to read. Besides the general consumer information and recipes, the magazine also contains meeting announcements, safety tips, energy efficiency information, board candidate N MISSIO CY OF MER biographies, sign-up forms for co-op programs and more. Read it each month and get the latest news from your electric co-op.
Fish Fry Leads to Outage in NW
This fish story comes from the Northwest but sounds a little familiar to co-op linemen in Colorado who have seen all kinds of animals, snakes and fish cause similar problems. There was an outage and a crew was dispatched. What they found, high atop an electric structure in southern Oregon, was a fish that fell into the circuit and caused a transformer to blow out. It happens. Birds of prey dropped their dinner into power lines or other structures before. What surprised the linemen was that this fish was a sculpin, a fish from the bottom of the ocean. It lives deep below the surface of the water so it’s unclear how an osprey or some other bird got it in the first place. It’s not surprising that the bird dropped it, since it was a sizable catch, measuring 10-12 inches in length and 5.5 inches wide at its head. coloradocountrylife.coop