Share Your Utility’s Story: T&D World Magazine Open to Utility-Led Features

T&D World, your source for critical information for utility professionals about electric power-delivery systems, is seeking bylined features from electric utilities.

T&D World magazine covers the world of energy delivery, including power grid resiliency, electric utility operations, renewables, electrification, distributed energy, substations, wildfire mitigation, data analytics, mobile workforces and undergrounding.

Of particular interest are articles: (1) describing problems encountered and how they have been solved, (2) featuring an unusual installation or engineering application and (3) presenting labor-saving/cost-saving methods or designs. Stories will be edited for overtly commercial language to present a vendor-neutral perspective.

For our editorial process, we require about a two-month lead time for features, meaning that a feature intended for our January issue would need to have all materials in to our editors by November 1, for example.

Materials in this case means: A draft story (1500-2000-words with byline and author bios) plus 4-8 high-resolution, original photos (at least 1 MB in size, .jpeg format preferred, with credits and captions). Any graphics sent need to be native and editable, meaning sent to us in the same file formats in which they were created.

In this call for submissions, the editors of T&D World are looking for features covering topics including, but not limited to:

·            Distributed Energy Resources, Microgrids and Renewable Integration

·             Disaster Planning, Storm Hardening, Outage Recovery and Restoration

·             Undergrounding Projects

·             Power Grid Modernization

·             Power Line Inspections, Including Drones and Fault Detection

·             Transmission Siting, Permitting, Construction, Capacity and Planning

·             Utility Communications, GIS, IT/OT and Software Systems

·             Vegetation Management, Preventative Maintenance and Right-of-Way Management

·             Workforce Safety and Training

·             Wildfire Mitigation, Arrestors and Surge Protectors

·             Substation Design, Upgrades, Installations and Maintenance

·             Cyber and Physical Security

Content Requirements

In-depth case study article FOR PRINT and/or digital publication: Articles with the most impact are from the perspective of a utility rather than that of consultants, manufacturers, or suppliers. Stories will be edited for overtly commercial language to present a vendor-neutral perspective.

Please prepare a 1500-2000-word article with four to eight graphical elements on how a utility successfully tackled a major initiative. This will include major construction or rebuild initiatives and will Include products, methods and technologies that benefit its business, customers, operations. Please do not be afraid to include challenges, obstacles and what did and didn’t work. Include relevant images and diagrams.

Include a short, 50- to 75-word professional biographical summary for each author along with their e-mail address. Include a description of present company position, education, professional affiliations and professional accomplishments.

The time between article acceptance and publication varies. We attempt to place articles in an appropriate issue as soon as possible.

Photograph Guidelines

The jpeg file size for a single image should be at least 700 kB. We prefer images at 2 MB or higher. Stock photos should be avoided due to licensing and copyright issues. When stock photos are sent, please identify the stock company used. Screen captures should be captured at full screen.

Avoid corporate names and logos and on products or backgrounds in photos. And, please avoid use date stamps in photo images.

Provide descriptive captions and credits for each photograph. If the people in the photo are identifiable, provide the name, title, and employer for each person. Avoid using the author(s) in photos if possible. GIF images are generally low resolution and can’t be converted for print.

For graphics, we prefer the digital or vector versions of graphs, charts and map etc. Keep the illustrations neat and clean without too much detail. Light-to-medium line weights work best. Please avoid hairlines and heavy lines. Please avoid converting graphs, charts and maps to a flat jpeg format.

Please provide the native file in its original format, so that they can be adapted to fit our editorial styles. We can accept many file formats including the following: vsd (Visio); dwg (Visio or CAD); svg (Visio or CAD); ai, wmf or eps (Illustrator); and Excel for graphs, charts and maps.

Do not embed illustrations or photographs in the manuscript document. Please provide images as separate files with a map of the image file names to figure captions.

For questions regarding articles please contact Jeff Postelwait, Senior Editor, at [email protected] or 541.844.9063

Award-Winning Coverage

For the second year in a row, T&D World writers won recognition from leading organizations representing the business-to-business press.

T&D World’s editors won regional awards in the 2023 American Society of Business Publication Editors Azbee Awards of Excellence. One of the most competitive awards programs for trade media, the Azbees highlight editorial and design excellence within magazines, newsletters, digital and social media.

T&D World Senior Editor Jeff Postelwait won an Impact/Investigative award of excellence for his original feature, “Texas’ Big Freeze: The 2021 Power Crisis and the Lessons Learned One Year Later,” which ran in January 2022.

Our May 2022 Wildfire Mitigation supplement issue won a Special Issue or Supplement Azbee award of excellence. This issue was put together by Jeff Postelwait, Senior Editor; Nikki Chandler, Associate Content Director; Susan Lakin, Art Director; Gene Wolf, Technical Writer; and Jerry Borland, Technical Editor.

Also, Endeavor Business Media Vice President of Content, Teresa Hansen, won an award of excellence in the Editor’s Letter category for her regular Global Viewpoint section, which provide fact-based analysis on electric utility topics from an expert with decades of experience in this industry.

Coverage from T&D World magazine was recognized as a 2022 Jesse H. Neal award finalist from the Software & Information Industry Association for a pair of stories on workplace diversity and women in the line trade. The Neal Awards are the premier awards program honoring B2B journalism.

T&D World also won a regional award in the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion category in the 2022 Azbee Awards of Excellence.