Met-Ed upgrades its distribution system in Monroe County, Pennsylvania

Met-Ed completed an upgrade to its distribution system in southern Monroe County in Pennsylvania to minimize the length of service disruptions, particularly during severe summer storms.

The project included rebuilding existing power lines to provide a second source of electricity to a substation near Snydersville. The 34.5 kilovolt (kV) source line runs four miles along South Easton Belmont Pike and Middle Easton Belmont Pike. It was rebuilt as a three-wire line with more electrical capacity, with taller poles, new wire, transformers, and fuses. It is designed to help prevent service disruptions and restore power faster for nearly 2,300 customers.

The initiative is part of Met-Ed’s five-year, $153 million Long Term Infrastructure Improvement Plan to accelerate capital investments in the company’s electric distribution system.

“We’ve reconstructed three power lines to add a second source of electricity for the substation, providing redundancy that allows us to keep the lights on for many of our customers in Snydersville and Hamilton and Stroud Townships when our crews must make repairs or perform maintenance,” Scott Wyman, president of FirstEnergy’s Pennsylvania Operations, said. “This substation had been fed by a single power line that traverses dense forest, steep hillsides and swamps, increasing the potential for lengthy tree-related outages in hard-to-access areas.”

Additionally, two devices enabled with supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) technology were installed in the substation, with two others placed on key spots along the line. SCADA conveys real-time information about the voltage and electric current conditions to distribution system operators.

Met-Ed, a subsidiary of FirstEnergy, serves approximately 580,000 customers in eastern and southeastern Pennsylvania.