JOSEPHINE — An Oncor construction project causing power outages in recent weeks is expected to be completed soon.
The average outage is about 15 minutes, but some have been nearly an hour, said Kerri Dunn, an Oncor spokeswoman. She said some outages have been as brief as 15 seconds.
It’s unclear exactly how many residents in the area have had power outages related to the construction project, but hundreds of Oncor customers are affected, Dunn said.
Dunn said the upgrades will improve long-term service reliability for the area.
“It helps us move more power through the area, so if we see higher demand in winter seasons or growth, it meets both of those needs,” Dunn said.
In late October, there were seven outages within a nine-day period — five of which were on the same day.
Early last week, when a line of storms swept through many parts of North Texas, an outage unrelated to the construction project affected about 400 customers in the area.
Dunn said the construction project requires work on live wires above ground. The protective devices needed to keep workers safe are sensitive to wind and any other potential contact.
Outages, especially during windy days, were likely caused by the protection devices, Dunn said.
The outages in late-October were likely caused by wind gusts, she added.
“We understand the frustration that multiple outages would bring our customers, so personnel patrolled the line and identified an area that was likely repeatedly setting off the sensors, then performed specific repairs to that location to minimize the risk of similar outages,” Dunn said.
Oncor also reached out to affected customers and city officials to provide information about the ongoing upgrade project and the recent outages.
The construction project, which spans about 3.5 miles, started around early October and is expected to be completed before the end of the year.
“This specific stretch of lines was identified as an area to upgrade early this year, and we have had other local reliability efforts in planning or in process,” she said.
In addition to the 3.5-mile stretch project, Oncor is “nearing completion” on a new substation to help service the area. Next year, the company is looking to install new automated devices to improve reliability, Dunn said.
“These devices will ultimately be able to communicate with one another and with Oncor control centers to quickly identify and isolate damaged equipment and reroute power to those that can safely receive it, helping to shorten outage times and decrease the number of customers affected by outage events,” Dunn said.
Josephine City Administrator Lisa Palomba said she and other city staff notified Oncor about outages in the fast-growing town earlier this year. From 2017 to 2022, the city’s population ballooned from about 1,200 to nearly 3,500 U.S. Census data showed.
“It seemed like the outages were a little more frequent than what someone would expect,” Palomba said.
As far as she is aware, recent outages in Josephine affected Oncor customers. Farmers Electric Cooperative also provides electric services in the area.
Palomba said the project started later than city officials had expected but added that she’s hopeful the upgrades will remedy some of the electricity issues the city has faced.
Linda Jangula, who moved to Josephine last year with her husband Eugene, said her home has experienced the outages “a couple” of times. One of those days, Linda said she lost power while she was working on her computer.
“It’s frustrating at the moment, but I was so thankful that Oncor did call us and tell us that this could be happening for a couple of days, and that they wouldn’t last long,” Jangula said. “And they didn’t, and I was really pleased with that.”