ATHABASCA – Fresh off the heels of the Highway 831 wildfire that caused the Village of Boyle and portions of Athabasca County to evacuate, county councillors got some additional information about how power companies plan for and respond to fires.
During the May 13 meeting, councillors heard from AltaLink, an electricity transmission company that serves 85 per cent of Albertans, including Athabasca County.
“Wildfires are becoming a lot more severe and significant on the landscape; in the last couple of years, we’ve seen over 2,200 fires reported,” said Colin Harvey, the company’s Municipal Relations manager.
“Less than 10 per cent of fires are started by electrical infrastructure. However, we fully acknowledge that the risk remains and we take it very seriously.”
Harvey, who was joined by emergency response program manager Brian Kelly and wildfire operation systems engineer Brendan Pan, said AltaLink takes a multi-faceted approach to mitigation, ranging from risk assessment to last resort power shutoffs.
Public Safety Power Shut offs (PSPS) are the most serious option Altalink uses to help prevent or mitigate fires. In areas the company has identified as high risk, including the Village of Boyle, AltaLink will preemptively shut of power to prevent a fire from being caused by their own equipment.
“When we hit certain thresholds in terms of weather conditions, we may look to turn off the power lines so if the line did create a spark or ignition point, we’re able to remove that risk from the equation,” said Harvey.
“It’s not something we want to do, but we do feel it’s a good step to take when the communities are more at risk.”
In the Boyle-area, Harvey said AltaLink is watching for a combination of wind speeds over 60 kilometres an hour, and a fire weather index above 60.
“We haven’t hit both those thresholds in a while; I’m sure we’ve been over 60 on the fire index, or above 60 on the wind gusts, but we haven’t been over both together. We’re hoping the likelihood of having a PSPS is low, but the potential is out there as we monitor.”
AltaLink did utilize a PSPS during the recent fire that happened near Redwater as a preventative measure. Once a fire has started, depending on conditions, they may choose to turn off power to prevent the electricity from making the situation worse.
“It’s one of those things that people always ask about when wildfires hit, ‘Was our power shut off?’ because of the damage that comes with that in homes. We really appreciate all you’ve done for Boyle,” said county Reeve Tracy Holland.
Municipalities receive a weekly email from AltaLink with an up-to-date report on the possibility of a PSPS taking place. If conditions are moving in that direction, AltaLink starts to work with emergency management to prepare for the possibility, and two to four days beforehand is when municipal leaders and critical customers, like hospitals, are notified.
Once initiated, there’s no set time frame for the outage to continue. AltaLink recommends residents be prepared for at least 72 hours and have an emergency plan in place that doesn’t require power to execute. For more information on how to be prepared, visit the government of Canada’s guide on emergency readiness here.
