Horry Electric Cooperative is among a group of South Carolina electric cooperatives that will receive more than $7 million in federal funding for projects dedicated to making the state’s power grid more resilient to extreme weather.
The Conway-based cooperative will receive nearly $780,000 to install self-healing devices on utility poles that serve disadvantaged communities. These devices can automatically restore power within seconds of outages caused by severe storms.
The self-healing devices will ensure a stable power supply for a range of important facilities, including a high school, a newly constructed middle school, a Walmart, a future hospital, several banks, water and sewer facilities, gas stations, and small businesses.
“We felt this project could best serve members by strengthening reliability in a vital area of our community that serves as a hub for various essential services, including schools, grocery stores, gas stations and public utilities,” Horry Electric’s Executive Vice President and CEO Danny Shelley said. “Horry Electric’s board of trustees is excited to be approved for this grant.”
The grant will cover two-thirds of the cost for the self-healing system. Horry Electric’s project is one of 18 approved in South Carolina to reduce power outages and improve restoration times.
South Carolina’s electric cooperatives and other electric utilities applied to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for the grants, which are funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
Santee Cooper is administering the grants, which will primarily benefit disadvantaged communities, through its Grid Resilience Grant Program.
“The projects that were submitted range from burying overhead power lines to adding self-healing equipment that improves restoration ability,” Santee Cooper CEO Jimmy Staton said. “Collectively they will make South Carolina’s electric grid stronger in the face of hurricanes and other extreme weather. It has been our privilege to work with the DOE and so many utilities across the state who are driven to provide the best service possible to their members and customers.”
Electric cooperatives that will receive grants include:
- Berkeley Electric: $982,228 to decrease restoration times by installing a fault location, isolation and service restoration system.
- Broad River Electric: $183,964 to increase reliability by installing remote-controlled devices and new controls to improve monitoring and control capabilities.
- Coastal Electric: $796,000 to improve reliability by replacing aging overhead power lines with underground lines.
- Fairfield Electric: $1,125,000 for two projects. One will allow for remote power restoration by updating equipment and improving system monitoring and control. The other will rebuild four miles of overhead power lines serving a wastewater treatment plant in a remote area that has experienced extended outages.
- Horry Electric: $779,823 for a self-healing system that will improve reliability and reduce outage times.
- Palmetto Electric: $1,946,000 to replace 44 aging hydraulic reclosers with new electronically controlled reclosers with remote monitoring.
- York Electric: $1,261,955 for five projects, including building backup power lines, installing underground line sand burying existing lines to improve system reliability.