For this year in the O’Higgins region, the investment in the 2024 Winter Plan of the CGE company exceeds 1,500 million pesos, and more than half of these resources are destined for the pruning or felling of vegetation near the networks. . This preventive action seeks to avoid electrical failures resulting from this trees since “about 30 percent of service interruptions in general are associated with the presence of trees and branches in contact with the distribution lines,” according to Alex. Lobos, Rancagua-Cachapoal Zonal Manager of CGE.
Between January and April of each year the company is dedicated to carrying out the intervention on these nearby trees or on the networks in order to clear them and be better prepared for the winter period. “This year we carried out 80 kilometers of effective pruning in the region and inspected more than 15 thousand medium voltage poles in order to identify any type of damage,” explained the manager. Maintenance continues throughout the year and in September they carry out a new inspection process for classified points within their summer plan, which seeks to prevent forest fires due to electrical origin.
Chilean law indicates that the safety strip under the power lines must be clear within a margin of two meters on each side of where the cables pass, where CGE has the duty to keep it clear. In the event that the tree is within private property, the person in charge of maintaining the tree is the owner of the land, preventing its excessive growth that affects the lines. However, if the trees are located on public roads and/or urban areas – regardless of who planted them -, it is the responsibility of the municipality to maintain them by ordinance. But this pruning must be done before the trees touch the network, because only the company and trained and authorized personnel can intervene on an energized line. In this regard, Alex Lobos explained that, if the branches already touch the network, neighbors can ask CGE for this pruning by calling customers 800 800 767 or on the website (www.cge.cl). “The client makes the request and within a period of no more than 30 days our staff goes to the site to carry out an evaluation of the work and then schedule its execution,” he said.
“Our position today is that hopefully a tree can be cut down, not with ornamental pruning but with safety pruning. This may sound drastic, but if a tree is tucked into the net and I only prune the branches above the line, the growing foliage on the side, in a windy situation, the remaining branches will still touch the lines. causing a supply cut,” indicated the zonal representative, because as Lobos has always pointed out, the idea is always that “we do not have supply interruptions and if there are any, that they be replaced as quickly as possible.”
CLIMATE CONTINGENTIAL
To the above, CGE added more than 2,800 thermographic inspections of the networks consisting of measuring the temperature of the lines. “We take an x-ray of the network at the connection points of the cables, where as a result of overload in the system or an accident or collision with a pole, a short circuit occurs that triggers a large flow of current affecting these connection points,” Lobos explained. “The temperature difference indicates that there is an anomaly and the company repairs it on the energized line, without a power cut. “So it allows us to work on a failure before it happens.”
Likewise, CGE added the increase in power in the distribution transformers, which, according to Lobos, are located on the street poles. “We identified some with capacity problems due to increased consumption, so we changed to larger ones or interspersed them to divide the loads,” he said about these planning activities in the winter plan for 2024.
And given the weather contingencies of this period of the year, the company trains its personnel, either bringing contractor personnel from other areas if necessary or assigning people to dispatch brigades to handle claims. “At the same time, a maintenance plan is being carried out for generating equipment for electro-dependent people and for this reason we assign equipment that is pending the receipt of claims from people with patients of this type,” added the local representative of the company, requesting that people who are diagnosed by their doctor with this condition to register with CGE for the delivery of an electric generator on loan that serves as a backup in case of a power outage. This special attention for electrodependents through the hotline 800 203 180 adds a series of benefits for these patients that includes a discount on their electricity bill, for example.
Finally, the zonal manager Alex Lobos asks the company’s customers to file the claim at the time of the supply interruption. “We ask that you make your claim through all our platforms (see box) by WhatsApp, website or 800 line, which are our fastest channels to do so. If where there is a failure, there are a minimum of complaints filed, because sometimes the neighbors often trust that only one will do it, the brigade will be sent to places where there will be a greater number of complaints,” the executive argued.
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