Re: Thoughts on electric utilities

"it costs FPL between $1,223 and $2,025 per lot to install our standard overhead service. Underground on the other hand, costs between $1,685 and $2,491 per lot."

that's only 22% more to bury. not exactly prohibitive. and for the reliability alone, a no-brainer.

but for quarter-on-quarter profitability, overhead is the way to go. maybe these guys should consider the additional cost of finance if they didn't enjoy their mandated monopoly status - that might change their minds.

You're only as strong as your weakest link. I live in a 40 year old subdivision of about 14 houses. Have underground power. The transformer is buried in the corner of my front yard. There's an easement down the side where they buried the input cable. It goes down the easement to a pole in the back corner of my yard. Up the pole through the trees and overhead from there back to the source. So much for reliability.

wow, that sounds completely retarded!

there's not a lot of point burying transformers in residential neighborhoods - they seldom get knocked out unless mounted on poles. just keep the cables underground where they're not subject to the usual.

Sounds VERY common actually. At least in NY State.

The local Telco goes over/under all over the place, so does power. in front of my place telco is underground. Go to the neighbors and you find a pole where it comes up and goes across the lot to another state road (about 200 feet) goes back underground and to a local switch house. Comes out of there and goes underground to the other end of town, then back in the air to the next town, where it drops underground to the main fiber junction.

Power is even screwier. From the corner less than 1/8th mile there is 3 phase that goes down a different road and over the hill. It goes up and feeds a different hamlet. The power that feeds my place comes down the road in front of the house in the air. We are fed off the last transformer. The feed comes down to the same corner the three phase stops and turns back down a different state road but stops at the first pole, right next to a different house on the road behind my place. But that house is fed from the same transformer that I'm on.

Then if you follow the feed from my place it goes up the road to a farm about 200 feet up, then it takes a hard right and crosses a pair of fields to the same road that goes behind my place. From the air it looks like a loop a Q next to it and an L with no connections between any of them.

I'll bet there is 15 miles of wire within 3 square miles.

they do have a budget for that stuff, but i doubt they anticipated and carry one of that size.

i think the union element is a factor as well though. electrical utilities are pretty much a closed shop - no union, no operation. winter repairs are a significant source of overtime - i can't see a consistent effort to reduce maintenance or headcount by burying being enthusiastically received.

Per lot. That means per adjacent or adjoining lot.

And that's why t hey DO bury power lines for new areas with adjoining lots.