CenterPoint SVP talks power outage assessments, their response to Beryl

HOUSTON - On Tuesday night, CenterPoint Energy released a new map showing power restoration progress around the Houston area after two million were left without electricity when Hurricane Beryl hit the city.

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Darin Carroll, Senior Vice President of Operations at CenterPoint, sat down with FOX 26 anchor Anthony Antoine to talk about the company's efforts in restoring power for Houstonians and their response to the devastation.

You can read a transcript of the full interview below.

CenterPoint discusses restoration efforts after Beryl

Darin Carroll SVP of Operations at CenterPoint Energy sat down with FOX 26 anchor Anthony Antoine to talk about the company's efforts in restoring power for more than a million Houstonians after Hurricane Beryl and their response to the devastation.

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Anthony Antoine

All right, Darren, first and foremost, let's start with the benchmarks. You guys would like to have one million customers restored here by the end of the day. Are we still on track?

Darin Carroll

We are definitely on track for that. I feel very confident in that. Okay. Yep. Okay.

Also, the outage tracker that you guys released there last night, lots of folks, including myself as users, as I try to use that map. And it seems to be some inconsistencies with folks who the map says have power but in reality, do not have power. What are the issues there or is this something we are unaware of?

Yeah. No, it's a technical thing and it's honestly tough to explain, but I'll try my best. You've basically got different levels, you know, that make up an electric system, an electric grid. And what the green polygon, for instance, on that map is demonstrating when somebody sees that, is that that circuit that feeds all of the the other lines into the residential communities is indeed energized. However, downstream of that, there can be what we call nested outages or damage to laterals or people's personal service lines that can impact whether or not their service is on. We've not completed damage assessment. Yeah, that'll be done within the next 24 hours. And after that we will have a lot more information about those nested outages that we can then start sharing with customers. What we want customers to take away, though, is that we know about them, even though it may show that they're in a green zone. We know that their power is out and we will work to restore their power.

Were you guys forced a little bit because of the circumstances to release that map a little bit sooner than you would have liked?

I wouldn't call it forced. This is actually something we created during the Derecho. We started sharing. We found it as a best practice and we want to continue to fine-tune it. And so that's what we're that's what we're doing right now. We have an entire team thats set up focused just on the data behind that map and and working to refresh it. You know, three times a day for customers so that it's as accurate as it can be. Yeah.

And you mentioned assessments. Where are you with those assessments? Because a lot of folks that I'm seeing on social media are saying we don't see the trucks out there. You know, we want to see more trucks out there, especially if we're being told we have 11,500 crews on the streets. We're not seeing it. So what are you saying to the public in response to that?

Certainly, yeah. There's a difference in the crews that come out and do the repairs as compared to the folks that are doing the assessment. Folks that are doing the assessments could be in pickup trucks and may, you know, may not be as prominent in the community. But they're out walking these lines. As of the end of the day, yesterday, we had walked 4,500 miles worth of distribution line to check for damage to those lines. By the end of the day will be 75, 80% complete with that and we'll wrap up tomorrow. After that, then you'll start seeing, you know, crews, you know, out in these neighborhoods in mass, repairing all the damage that was found by these damage assessors.

So the assessments will be done tomorrow?

Correct.

Okay. So what have the additional crew members been doing the last 48 hours or so?

They're out on the system. They just may not be in some places where, you know, there are places where there's so much damage that you would not be able to walk without seeing crew members working because that damage has already been assessed. It was prioritized based on customer count and other things. And so there are plenty of communities where you go out and you're going to see a ton of trucks working, and that's where those folks have been.

And a lot of folks have downed trees on those power lines. They don't have electricity. Whose responsibility is it to cut down those trees and remove them? Whether it's the homeowner or CenterPoint? How do you determine that?

It really depends on who has ownership of the service line, and that does vary, unfortunately, throughout our service territory. If it's on the main line, it is our responsibility and we will take care of that. But there are situations where it could have damaged, for instance, a customer's, Weatherhead, the pipe that goes up the side of the customer's house to receive the overhead cable coming into the house. If that's damaged, that's going to be the customer's responsibility to get repaired.

The best way for them to reach out to you to figure out who's responsible, is there a number they can call or what's the best route to have that conversation?

There are ways that they can get in contact with us, and I'll work with our communications team to make sure that we start sharing that broadly with customers.

Mobile generation, trying to get some of those mobile units out in the community. Have you made the assessment of if or when they'll be sent out in the community and when will that happen?

We do. We have several of them out right now. The last count was either eight or 10. Just I'm not sure about when they were actually energized, but I know that we had ten mobilized out in the community. And so they're already providing relief to you know, different emergency operation centers and other things.

Do you suspect that number will increase or is pretty comfortable with ten right now?

It just depends on the applicability of the situation. Those mobile units are fantastic and they're very flexible, but they are not made for every single purpose. Right. And so it really just depends on applicability. But certainly, when we find those opportunities, we're going to go take advantage of them.

Yeah, I think it's fair to say we both understand there's some frustration here from the general public. This was a category one hurricane when it made landfall then a tropical storm and lifelong Houstonians are saying like, it's concerning that a situation like this, a system like this, cripples essentially a large portion of the people that receive electricity. This is kind of an entry point for a storm like this, Category One. What are we going to do when it's three, four or five?

Right. Yeah. I think the first thing we would try to have people understand is and, it's fairly technical, but the system actually operated as designed. And the best analog I have for this is you can imagine, you know, standing at your bathroom sink using a hairdryer. Let's say that you've got the sink full of water and you drop the hairdryer in the sink. Well, you've got a receptacle that has a built-in circuit interrupter that will cut the electricity to that appliance immediately for your safety and for the safety of the upstream system in your house. Right. Otherwise, it would keep feeding electricity, which is a hazard. Our system is the exact same thing. It's more complicated, more sophisticated, but same concept. And so the reason we've been able to get a million customers on and less than around 48 hours, which is the fastest we've ever gotten a million customers on, is because of the investments and the preparation that happened ahead of this storm. So, you know, if you think about a tree falling, maybe in the past it would have taken out multiple poles when it pulled the cable down. But this storm, the pole stood up and it just took the cable down. So we're able to pick that cable back up, put it on the poles. It's a much faster repair. Right. So, even though we've had a lot of outages, you know, restoring a million in 48 hours is still pretty impressive.

But you're saying you believe that you guys were prepared?

I believe we were prepared, correct.

So for a lot of folks that we're tracking this storm or even watching this Friday, Saturday, Sunday, how many crews were staged and where?

Yeah. So we had 4,500 FTs, individuals coming from other states into Houston. We procured those resources before the storm ever made landfall. Because they were coming from other states, they staged at different points. Right. Whatever made sense for them logistically and waited for the storm to pass.

So they made the decision? Not CenterPoint?

That's right. Because they've got to base their safety, their personal safety, on what they're seeing. Right. And where the storm's path is going. We don't obviously want them staged here when it hits because now it puts them in harm's way, which is not fair to that individual.

Right. So now the acting governor, Dan Patrick, said he had to sign a waiver to get that number up to more than 10,000 crews here in the community. What does that waiver entail and what was the decision made for him to then get involved to sign that waiver to get backup crews here?

You know, I've not personally laid eyes on the waiver, but it was never an obstacle for us getting crews. We didn't see that as an obstacle for us making decisions around how many resources we needed to procure or when. So I can't get into details about what's in the waiver.

And when was the plan finalized for CenterPoint? When did you guys see that this is the best possible way for us to assist the community after the storm?

There's not a point at which it ends. We follow an incident command system here and we meet daily, not just after the event happens, but as it's in the Gulf and as its approaching. And we're making decisions based on the best information that we have at the time. And so all the way through the event, you know, we're doing those same things. We're making decisions in the moment based on the circumstances to do a better job for our customers.

Another reason I asked that line of questioning is because essentially we had someone from CenterPoint say that the storm veered off its path and it essentially was more significant of an impact than we anticipated. That might not sit well with a lot of people because we're watching that storm, every day, every report, it tracked further and further up towards Houston. So my concern is that could you have done more instead of having 4,500 crews available at the ready, could we have increased that number, so the governor did not have to sign a waiver to potentially even delay that process, because every minute, every hour is super important right now.

Yeah, I think we can always make better decisions with the benefit of hindsight. Right. That's how life works. In the moment, like I said, we were making the decision, the best decisions we had with the information that was available to us at the time. There were varying reports for which path the storm was going to take. It ultimately took the path that created the most damage and havoc for us. But again, we procured resources based on what we thought was going to happen at that time.

And then so moving forward, obviously, we were in the thick of it right now. But is there going to be a conversation or review of what has been taking place in the last 48 hours or so to be better prepared for the future? Because it's not a matter of when we are going to see, it's just a matter of when we're going to see another category three or four hurricane coming.

Yeah, an after-action reviews are a part of who we are, as part of our DNA. We do them after major events like this. We do them after much smaller events. We are a learning culture standpoint. We always want to get better at what we do. You know, I talked earlier about the million customers having been restored in 48 hours, which is the quickest ever. We didn't get there by just repeating the same sorts of practices that we had in the past. We've refined them over time as we learned during after-action reviews.

Yeah. And then I don't know much about the industry that is your expertise. Will there also be conversations about how to improve or reinvest in some of the infrastructure that's here throughout the city? Is that a conversation that you foresee happening with the legislature, even?

It's already happening. We filed for a resiliency plan. We were the first in the state to do that. It includes things like installing composite poles where wood poles would have been installed in the past or different ways to segment our infrastructure so that when outages happen, it affects a smaller number of customers. So we're ready to make those investments. We've actually already seen the benefit of some of those investments like composite poles. Even with this storm, we've got places down on the coast where we have some composite poles and some wood poles. The composite poles are just fine, the wood poles broke. So we're going to be making those investments over time to get better.

I would imagine a lot of the linemen, some of the linemen that you guys have here were also impacted by the storms as well. Let's talk about the linemen's health. It's the heat advisory outside feels like 105 plus degrees. What does it feel like up there when they're doing some of that work? And how do you guys make sure that they're healthy?

That's a great question. Thank you for asking that. They work incredibly hard. And, you know, when you layer on the PPE that they have to wear as well, the rubber goods and other things, it gets really, really hot for them. They're working 16-hour shifts. In the past. there may have been practices where they would work longer than that. We don't want them to do that and we want them to stop and get plenty of rest at all of our staging sites and out-of-the-work sites, we're delivering Gatorade, water, ice. You know, every day we talk about the dangers of heat. They do safety briefings, you know, with the crews. Before a crew can even go work on our system at the staging site, they have to go through a safety briefing and safety orientation to learn how to work on our system. So there are lots of things that we're doing to keep their safety top of mind. At the end of the day, regardless of how many customers we get restored and how quickly we see it, you know, as not being successful if somebody got hurt. Right. So their safety is top of mind for us.

And then just so I can get a better understanding of some of the numbers, we're going to reach the point where we restore a million people here today. A million people will still be without power. Where's the bulk of that? I would imagine Harris County. But do you have a number, a rough estimate for us?

So I talked earlier about the damage assessment assessment phase that will be concluding tomorrow. We'll have a lot more information on that, you know, in the next 24 to 48 hours that we'll be sharing more publicly. We've been hesitant at this point to share what we would call a global estimated time of restoration for everything because we really want to understand where those heavy pockets of damage are and set fair expectations with customers on what they can expect. But we do expect that there's a bulk of the system that we're going to be able to get up quicker and then we're going to have some at the end where the damage is just so great that it's going to take a little bit longer.

Any closing remarks?

No, I just want to reinforce that, you know, we empathize with all of our customers' communities. We understand how hard it is. Many of us were impacted as well. Personally, I don't have any power either, You know, and a lot of the folks that are out working on the system, the linemen, you know, the support personnel, they don't have power. So, you know, we're impacted by this as well. We understand. And, you know, we are not going to stop until we get every last customer restored.

And then safe to say we're still looking at about a one-week window to get everyone back.

You know, I don't want to share. I don't want to front-run, you know what will come out of that damage assessment. I just don't think that's fair to do. But that information will be coming out soon.

All right, Darren, thank you so much.

Houston