Columbus Light and Water Department General Manager Todd Gale Tuesday discussed long- and short-term projects, during a meeting of the Columbus Rotary Club.
Gale, who has managed CLW since 2006, said customers soon will see changes in the way meters are read.
“We are looking at installing automatic meter readers for the city,” he explained. “These meters can be read every 30 minutes. It will tell our customers how much electricity will be used on a daily basis. We have 500 electric meters installed and 500 water meters installed. It’s been trying. It’s going to be tough to implement. But it will help our customers see when they are using the most electricity, so they can be more efficient. It’s the right thing to do.”
Gale said the meters cost $180 and he does not plan to eliminate any of the five meter readers currently employed with the department.
Electric transmitter lines, first put to use in the 1970s, eventually also will be replaced.
“Our board voted recently to replace these transmitters and replace them with steel ones,” Gale said. “We have 350 to change. We plan on doing 70 a year, for the next five years.”
The city purchases power from the Tennessee Valley Authority and Gale noted the power-supplying giant is going through some major changes in the coming years.
“TVA is a multigenerational facility,” he said. “They use hydro (water) power, coal, nuclear power and natural gas. The (Environmental Protection Agency) is pushing TVA to get out of the coal business, as the nation is going for cleaner, greener energy. They plan to eliminate five to seven coal units over the next few years. They will be moving more towards nuclear energy.”
Nuclear energy is making a comeback Gale said, although it declined substantially after the 1978 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, which is considered the worst nuclear-reactor accident in United States’ history.
“TVA was building two nuclear facilities when the incident occurred at Three Mile Island,” Gale noted. “This scared everyone and drove the nuclear energy business down. TVA is currently looking at getting some permits to re-launch its nuclear energy program.”
Although nuclear energy is part of the future for TVA, Gale said he feels the future of energy may be in our own backyard.
“I think natural gas is what’s going to help us through this energy situation,” he said. ” We have a lot of natural gas in the ground in Caledonia. TVA has a 15-year lease on the Caledonia natural gas.”
Jeff Clark was previously a reporter for The Dispatch.
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