After delays caused by torrential rain last year and cyclone activity earlier this year, Ergon Energy is set to have $2.4 million power upgrade to the Seaforth, Australia area up and running by early September- weather permitting.

General Manager Service Delivery Steve Leighton said further work on the commissioning of the new 14-km high voltage line from McKinley Creek substation to Seaforth is continuing. “The new line which duplicates the existing 11,000 volt feeder to the area will also provide us with alternative switching arrangements during times of contingency on the local distribution network meaning quicker restoration and response times to any localised problems” he said.

Leighton said the project honored a commitment given to 1,152 customers in the Seaforth, Ball Bay, Haliday Bay, Cape Hillsborough, Yakapari, The Leap, Balnagowan and Conningsby communities earlier last year to address local power issues by fast tracking a scheduled upgrade in the area. “While we did address the supply issues at the time in the short term, this project will ultimately provide an added level of comfort and reliability for these communities” he said.

“In order to safely and effectively commission the new line we have to do some preparatory work and construct sections of line where the new line crosses over the existing feeder. This will require a planned interruption.

To reduce the impact on the community Ergon Energy is bringing in ten large mobile generators to power 671 customers in the Seaforth, Ball Bay and Haliday Bay townships while this work is being done. These are being progressively installed prior to work being carried out. There will be two short outages for these customers, the first starting at 6:30 in the morning to connect generators and the second outage to disconnect the generators from the network starting at approximately 3:30 in the afternoon.

There is likely to be a smaller planned outage in early September to carry out final commissioning works.