A Southern California Edison Analysis indicates the new pole materials provide lower total owning costs on its distribution system. By Mike Rodin, Southern California Edison Southern California is known for its beautiful weather. What is less generally known is how downright inhospitable the California environment can be to an electric utility’s infrastructure. Nowhere is this more evident than in the case of the ubiquitous utility pole. As every transmission and distribution engineer knows, pole installation and maintenance represent a major cost factor for utilities. The effects of weathering, termites, rusting, high winds and fires take a toll on utility support infrastructure every year, which of course drives up maintenance costs, increases circuit interruptions and reduces overall system reliability. If a way could be found to mitigate these problems effectively, maintenance costs could be lowered and overall grid reliability improved.`   This modular composite pole is installed in San Bernardino, California, on the “Circuit of the Future”. (Photo by Kevin Coates.) Significant advancements have been made in the design and manufacture of transmission and distribution poles using new high-strength fiberglass fibers and polyurethane resins. Working with several composite pole manufacturers, Southern California Edison (SCE; Rosemead, California, U.S.) has been deploying various types of composite poles to specific locations in its service area to evaluate their performance. SCE recognizes that composite poles manufactured with the new materials hold promise for dramatically reducing pole life-cycle maintenance and the need for frequent pole replacements, even for reasons other than age. These improvements also hold promise for reducing the initial cost of setting a pole as well as reducing the need for pole replacements. FIRST THERE WAS WOOD The first electric utility poles used to support telegraph lines in the 19th century were from old forests. These trees were typically very dense and resilient hard woods. Today’s rapid-growth tree farms produce poles that are, of course, still wood. However, there is some degradation in the properties of rapid-growth poles: reduced durability, stiffness, and longevity. This means the new poles are less robust and do not resist insect infestation or wood rot as well and, therefore, have a shorter service life. These composite poles are framed with composite crossarms ready for helicopter transport to the mountainous installation location. These composite poles are framed with composite crossarms ready for helicopter transport to the mountainous installation location. To enhance pole longevity, today’s wood poles are treated with chemicals, such as Pentachlorophenol, suspended in a light oil as the vehicle or carrier to deliver the chemical treatment. This eventually presents utilities with a handling and disposal challenge when the poles reach the end of their service life, because the treated wood poles may fail hazardous-waste criteria. When treated wood is deemed hazardous, it cannot be abandoned in the field; it must be disposed of in specially permitted landfills. This practice increases ownership expense. Over time, it is likely that these disposal restrictions will become stricter. However, aside from wood rot or wood-boring insects, wood poles have a vulnerability that is especially problematic in California — they burn. This is where composite poles have a distinct advantage, as they are fire resistant and will not support combustion without the addition of an external heat source. COMPOSITE CHARACTERISTICS While not fireproof, composite poles are extremely fire resistant, particularly when coated with fire retardant. A propane flame can cause a composite pole to smolder with a limited amount of flame when applied directly to the surface of the pole; however, as soon as the flame is removed, the composite material ceases to smolder or produce flame. This makes composite poles extremely attractive for deployment in steep mountain canyons and ravines where wildfires may roll through an area in 20 to 30 minutes. In these locations, use of selected fire-retardant coatings can enable the poles to withstand up to two brush fires. More importantly, after exposure to fast-moving brush fires, the poles generally do not require replacement and will continue to support the lines and equipment with no loss of strength.   Even fully assembled, the composite pole is substantially lighter than wood or other materials and easily transported by a helicopter. The resilience of composites is one of their more remarkable features. Composites allow strength parameters to be accurately “dialed in” during manufacturing to meet the job specification. This saves time and money and eliminates waste. The service life of a composite pole is conservatively rated at approximately 70 years on average. In addition, composite poles are extremely lightweight and strong, and do not lose their strength over their lifetime. Some composite poles, such as those from Resin Systems Inc. (Calgary, Alberta, Canada), are manufactured and shipped as modular sections (typically, 15-ft. [4.5-m] lengths are nested one inside the other), which reduces transportation and installation costs. For example, two men can easily lift. an individual 15-ft. module of a pole and maneuver it into position without any heavy equipment. This ease of handling also applies to the crossarms, which are typically very heavy work for linemen. EMBRACING CHANGE Obviously, any new product or technology offered to the electric power industry needs to be thoroughly tested before it can be deployed to a live grid. To better evaluate new technologies that might enhance grid reliability and possibly lower service costs, SCE created a new section on the grid in the Inland Empire Region known as the “Circuit of the Future.” SCE worked closely with a number of composite pole manufacturers, including Powertrusion International (Tucson, Arizona, U.S.) and Resin Systems, to help them design and manufacture a series of composite poles that meet SCE’s needs in terms of strength, durability, serviceability and service life. Each composite pole company has its own patented method of production, which means each type of pole has a unique set of characteristics. For instance, the Powertrusion pole is a non-tapered (i.e. it has a constant diameter) pultruded pole, while the Resin Systems pole is manufactured by winding E-Glass and polyurethane resin along with other proprietary materials onto a

Severe weather reinforces utility’s decision to install fiberglass poles. By Steve Coltharp and Tim Vied, Western Kentucky Rural Electric Cooperative Corp. After losing more than 120 wood poles to Hurricane Ike in September 2008, Western Kentucky Rural Electric Co-operative Corp. (WKRECC) installed seven RS composite utility poles in its system on a trial basis. The composite poles were quickly put to the test when, in January 2009, a once-in-a-hundred-years ice storm rolled through the WKRECC territory. The storm took down more than 1600 wood poles; yet, while the composite poles were on circuits with damaged wood poles, not one composite pole was damaged. It took weeks for WKRECC to fully restore service to its customers. Hurricane Ike Western Kentucky is a serene place with gently rolling hills, meandering streams and rivers, and a lot of trees. WKRECC provides electric power to 38,000 customers living in four Western Kentucky counties. The cooperative’s 100 or so employees do their best to see that 11 substations, 15 miles (24 km) of transmission lines and 4000 miles (6437 km) of distribution lines reliably deliver electric power generated and transmitted by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). This is a predominantly agricultural area of the United States where things change relatively slowly. However, things changed rather abruptly when the region was hit by not one but two major weather events in less than five months.   Winston Chambers, a contract engineer with Patterson & Dewar Engineers, assesses damage to a double-circuit joint-use wood pole. First came Hurricane Ike, which surprisingly took an interior course northward over the WKRECC service territory. The hurricane brought sustained winds of 90 mph (145 kmph), toppled thousands of trees and destroyed more than 120 wood poles, knocking out power for weeks. A utility east of the WKRECC service territory had similar issues but not with about a dozen RS composite poles it had installed near Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S. Manufactured by RS Technologies, those poles emerged from the hurricane unscathed. WKRECC took notice. Actually, even before the storm, WKRECC has decided to purchase seven composite poles for a trial deployment. There were several primary reasons for trying out the composite poles: high strength, long life, zero maintenance, environmentally benign materials, light weight, and a modular design that makes installation easy. These benefits helped offset the somewhat-higher initial cost of the composite poles, which were about twice as much as the wood distribution poles they replaced. However, the freight costs for the composite poles were half as much as for wood poles and, according to the contractors who installed them, the composite poles were easier and faster to install, all of which saved money. During the Ike recovery phase in October 2008, the composite poles were installed along a road not too far from WKRECC’s warehouse. The next pole in the line was steel and stood across the road near an intersection. The Ice Storm It did not take WKRECC long to determine the right purchasing decision had been made. On Jan. 27, 2009, a vast swath of the United States was slammed by a brutal winter storm that coated everything with a thick layer of ice. More than 1600 wood poles went down. Many of them snapped like toothpicks under the loads brought about by ice-ladened lines, or by trees and heavy branches falling against the lines. WKRECC lost its entire system, which is fed by TVA, who was down for five days before it was able to restore its transmission. However, it took WKRECC 21 days to completely restore power, and this was only possible because of the mutual assistance help of 500 cooperative volunteers from North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, and Tennessee.   An extreme icing load caused this double-circuit double-deadend wood pole to snap. Things got a little crowded at WKRECC’s warehouse at times during this all-hands-on-deck period of reconstruction. In addition to storing supplies, the warehouse complex was also the site for putting up the volunteers and feeding them until all the work was done. Strength and Resilience Amidst all of the wreckage along the road where the composite poles were installed, the only pole damaged was the steel pole with two breaks. In other words, the composites held their designed load, plus the ice, plus a portion of the load formerly carried by the steel pole across the street. This was possible because of the high amount of elastic strain energy composite poles are able to absorb in high-load situations. Needless to say, the strength and resilience of these poles in such harsh conditions were both surprising and impressive. This wood pole was used to replace a steel pole that was damaged by the ice storm, because there were no composite poles in stock. As a result of this very positive experience, WKRECC decided to install three large-diameter composite poles to carry the lines out of a new substation considered to be in a critical location. Again, the assembly and installation of these poles were quick and straightforward. Not long after the substation project was completed in September 2009, WKRECC ordered 20 additional RS distribution poles to be part of a new 7.2-kV distribution line that is about 8000 ft (2438 m) of 397-kcmil spacer cable. The contractor’s feedback was that the lightweight composite poles were easy to handle and easy to set. The composite poles have to be drilled to fasten framing to them, and the contractor drilled these holes easily in the field. Assembly went quickly, the wire was strung, and the line was put into service soon thereafter.   Ice buildup on a typical three-phase pole. After the extreme weather events it has experienced recently, WKRECC now must consider more than just the initial capital costs in its purchasing decisions when buying poles. As mentioned earlier, shipping and installation costs with composite poles are less than that of wood poles. There is also the strength factor, which certainly plays a role in ensuring reliability and lowering maintenance costs. Unlike wood poles, composite poles

RS Technologies Inc., a manufacturer of advanced composite products for infrastructure markets, announces that its RS poles have withstood an important field test in Lajitas, Texas — a direct hit by a tornado. In spite of high winds and swirling debris, the RS poles demonstrated their worth and capability in hardening the Rio Grande Electric Cooperative Inc. (RGEC; Brackettville, Texas, U.S.) grid. RGEC maintains over 9400 miles (15,178 km) of distribution line and 143 miles (230 km) of transmission line in west Texas and southern New Mexico comprising an area over 27,000 sq miles (69,930 sq km). Rio Grande crews installing a large diameter three-module RS pole that obviates the need for guy wires. Note the relatively small equipment needed for the direct bury installation. (Photo by Patrick Harris, RS Technologies Inc.) Dan Laws, general manager and CEO for RGEC, stated, “A tornado touched down in Lajitas on Oct. 7. Several homes in the area had roofs ripped completely off. We had pad-mounted transformers and junction boxes swept completely off their pads. We lost eight 40-ft (12-m) Class 3 wooden poles on our brand new Study Butte-Lajitas 34.5-kV 3O line. These were snapped off like toothpicks 2 ft (0.6 m) above the ground. RGEC Operations reported that the RS composite poles that we installed in this area ‘did not budge at all.’” Even before the tornado struck, RGEC was already considering the purchase of additional RS poles for several projects because of their favorable previous experience installing RS poles. Obviously, the RGEC is now even more impressed with RS composite pole technology. “If we could afford to replace all our poles tomorrow with the RS pole, we would do it given the increased strength, durability and reliability that we believe these poles would provide,” said Larry T. Powell, director of    engineering for RGEC.

ActewAGL is installing composite poles into Canberra backyards from Armor Utility Structures for use in the power grid. One of the 28,000 composite poles to be installed as part of the upgrade A legacy of Canberra’s original planning, ActewAGL has about 28,000 low voltage poles in residential and commercial backyards within the ACT. As the poles are in backyards, the restricted access does not allow the installation of a standard wooden, concrete or steel single piece pole. The only multi-piece poles available for installation with a lifting beam are composite and steel. The advantages of composite poles compared with steel poles are lighter weight, non conductive, non corrosive and less expensive. The poles used in the replacement were a non conductive, lightweight pole which can be installed with light machinery and a lifting beam with a lower overall cost than wooden poles. Mini excavators and elevated work platforms, scaffolding and ladders are used to maintain and/or replace backyard low voltage poles. Three piece steel poles are used as each section is small enough to be man handled into position and installed onsite by a manual carbon fibre lifting beam. The pole hole and pole base is installed by a mini excavator. The fibre reinforced composite poles were sources from Canada by the local licencee AUS, who are planning to manufacture the poles locally in the near future. There are now 86 fibreglass low voltage poles in service in the ACT and another 72 will be installed. The project is expected to be completed in July. The poles have a polyurethane-based resin which provides structural advantages over traditional polyester or vinyl-ester based resins without diminishing the dielectric strength, resistance to rot and elimination of corrosion concerns and damage from insects and birds that the earlier composites were noted for. The poles come predrilled for standard applications and utilize concrete pole fittings for special applications. Unused holes are plugged to prevent access by bees, wasps and birds. According to ActewAGL’s overhead asset manager Wayne Cleland, the major challenges were arriving at the correct design configuration to meet ActewAGL requirements and suit the manufacturers standard range of products on offer. Modifications had to be made to the lifting device to allow for steel and fibreglass pole lifts as the poles have different centres of gravity. Staff were then trained in the installation. The fibreglass poles are made from two pieces. The first section is installed by the excavating machine prior to an outage. The new fibreglass pole is installed as close to the existing pole as possible. The second stage is installed using a carbon fibre lifting beam specifically designed for installing multi-piece poles in restricted locations. The lifting beam attaches the first stage of the fibreglass pole with the second stage hauled into position manually using a pulley system attached to the lifting beam. The lifting beam has been made from carbon fibre and aluminum to reduce the weight as the lifting beam is installed manually by the line staff during the pole replacement outage. The old wooden pole is cut down in stages to enable its removal from site. Fibreglass poles are consistent with ENA Specifications 009 for pole supply and performance has been trialled. Further development is proposed for the use of fibreglass poles on ActewAGL’s high voltage network.

By Kevin C. Coates Utilities have been working with several composite pole manufacturers and deploying various types of composite poles to service locations as pilot projects to evaluate composite pole performance. Recent winter storms have shown that composite utility poles have some important advantages over wood, concrete and steel structures. The storms that blasted across Canada and the northern tier of the United States this past winter often left behind a beautiful blanket of snow and ice. Only with some of these storms, the peace and tranquility that normally accompanies the end of a gentle snow fall was instead punctuated by loud periodic “cracks” and “booms;” the sounds of wood poles snapping like toothpicks, felled by trees that collapsed under the weight of massive amounts of ice and snow. Environmental regulations now consider treated wood poles as hazardous waste. In several instances, composite utility poles were installed as pilot projects in amongst the old wood pole infrastructure. To the amazement and pleasure of the host utilities, none of the composite utility poles came down or were significantly damaged. The various composite pole manufacturers could not have asked for a better test to prove the durability of their innovative poles. What is now becoming increasingly obvious to the electric power industry is that some composite utility poles have finally matured into the “ready for deployment stage” where they can now be accepted as part of a utility’s replacement pole inventory. And, small wonder considering the potential cost savings that composite poles represent for utility pole installation, maintenance, repair, replacement, life cycles, and disposal. The effects of weathering, termites, woodpeckers, rusting, high winds, and fires take a toll on pole infrastructure every year, which of course drives up maintenance costs, and reduces overall system reliability. The new generation of composite poles effectively mitigate these negative effects. Significant advancements have been made in the design and manufacture of transmission and distribution poles using new high-strength E-Glass fibres and polyurethane resins. Utilities are beginning to recognize that composite poles manufactured with these new materials hold promise for dramatically reducing pole life cycle maintenance and the need for frequent pole replacements, even for reasons other than age. These improvements also hold promise to reduce the initial cost of setting a pole as well as reducing the need for pole replacements. Background The first poles used to support telegraph lines in the 19th century were from old growth or ancient forests and typically came from very dense and resilient hard woods. Over the years, old growth forests were decimated and ceased to be the primary source for transmission and distribution poles. Today’s rapid growth tree farms now produce, over decades, a pole with somewhat degraded properties; mainly, reduced durability, stiffness, and longevity. This means new wood poles are less robust and do not resist insect infestation or wood rot as well as the older generation poles. Service life is logically shorter.   Rapid growth tree farms produce poles that are less robust and do not resist insect infestation or wood rot as well as older generation poles. To enhance pole longevity, today’s wood poles are treated with pentachlorophenol (a known carcinogen) suspended in a light oil (creosote) to enhance pole treatment. This eventually presents a handling and disposal challenge for utilities at the end of a pole’s service life. Environmental regulations now consider treated wood poles as hazardous waste; a significantly more expensive proposition than normal landfill disposal. Wood poles have another vulnerability that is especially problematic in forested areas – they burn. This is where composite poles have a distinct advantage – they resist fire and will not support combustion without the addition of an external heat source. Composite Characteristics While not fireproof, composite poles are extremely fire resistant; especially, when coated with fire retardant. A propane flame can cause a composite pole to smolder with a limited amount of flame when applied directly to the surface of the pole, but as soon as the flame is removed, the composite material ceases to smolder or produce flame. This makes composite poles ideal for deployment in forested areas. More importantly, after exposure to fast moving brush fires, the poles will not likely require replacement and will continue to support the lines and equipment with no loss of strength. The resilience of composites is one of their more desirable features. Composites allow strength parameters to be accurately “dialed-in” during manufacturing to meet the job specification. This saves time and money and eliminates waste. The service life of a composite pole is conservatively rated at 70 years on average. In addition, composite poles are extremely light weight, strong, and do not lose their strength over their lifetime. Industry Acceptance Obviously, any new product or technology offered to the electric power industry needs to be thoroughly tested before it can be deployed to a live grid. To better evaluate new electric power technologies that might enhance grid reliability and/or lower service costs, Southern California Edison (SCE) created a new section on their grid in San Bernardino known as the “Circuit of the Future.”   SCE pilot project pultruded transmission pole. Southern California Edison worked closely with a number of composite pole manufacturers to help them design and manufacture a series of composite poles that meet SCE’s needs in terms of strength, durability, serviceability, and service life. Each composite pole company has its own patented method of production, which means each type of pole has a unique set of characteristics.   Modular composite pole for SCE’s “Circuit of the Future”. The chemical composition of the resins, types and amounts of E-Glass, winding patterns and tensions vary significantly from one manufacture to another and account for various performance characteristic. These various manufacturing processes are naturally tightly held secrets. Hardware Design Attaching equipment to hollow composite poles, rather than solid wood poles, requires different hardware and methods. In most cases, hardware installation is very straightforward. For instance, rather than drilling holes and then bolting brackets directly into wood, a composite pole

Two new 105-foot composite fiberglass poles were set Dec. 27 on a Cinergy 138kV line one mile west of Clarksville Substation #327. The poles are on each side of a 700-foot span across Silver Creek and the levee. The original wood poles had to be replaced due to severe woodpecker damage. Replacing the damaged poles with more wood was considered, as were steel and concrete. Composite fiberglass poles were selected for several reasons. Fiberglass poles are resistant to insects, birds, and animals. Ground line decay is not a concern. And installation only requires the use of a single line truck. Also, there was only a two- to three-week wait for the fiberglass poles compared with up to six months for the alternatives. The composite fiberglass poles were easy to deliver to the job site. They came in five sections with the longest 35 feet in length. The total weight was 2,689 pounds, compared with 9,000 pounds for a comparable 105-foot class, H2 wood pole. Minimal traffic control measures were needed compared with those required to navigate a 105-foot wood pole through the city streets. The project’s engineer, Brian McNew of T&D Projects Engineering, was on site along with the factory representative, Gerry Thomas for RS Technologies, to lend their expertise to the project.