$1.7 million power safety upgrades underway on the Mornington Peninsula
New technology is being incorporated into parts of the electricity network in the Mornington Peninsula under a $1.7 million program to reduce the risk of fires and improve power reliability.
Electricity distributor United Energy has started replacing 5.1 kilometres of high-voltage powerlines with covered conductor across the Mornington Peninsula, with 2.9km set to be complete by Christmas.
Covered conductor is a technology that covers long lengths of powerlines and acts like insulted sleeves.
They are being rolled out in targeted high bushfire risk areas across the network where powerlines can also be affected by extreme weather like strong winds, salt spray, moisture or frost.
By protecting powerlines, the covers also help reduce the likelihood of faults and fires.
The areas chosen for the current rollout are based on bushfire risk and the number of previous outages in the area and follow United Energy’s successful trial of covered conductors in Cape Schanck in recent years.
Project manager Rob Doyle said the covered conductor works were part of a broader five-year program to roll out the technology across high risk areas.
“We’re progressively replacing the most vulnerable high voltage wires with this technology across our network to increase reliability and to decrease the risk of fires starting,” Mr Doyle said.
“This means the network is much better protected if an object such as a tree branch or an animal happens to comes into contact with powerlines.”
United Energy is conducting work to install:
- 2.5km at Myers and Balnarring Rd, Merricks North
- Over 1.3km of covered powerlines along Jones Road, Somerville
- 400 metres covered powerlines in Andrews Lane, Red Hill
- 900 metres covered powerlines in Graydens Road, Hastings
Work is expected to be completed by February. To allow crews to safely conduct this work, some planned power outages are required. United Energy is notifying customers directly of any planned outages as well as local traffic changes.
More than 10% of the Mornington Peninsula is considered Hazardous Bushfire Risk Area (HBRA) and United Energy has implemented a range of measures to keep the network as safe as possible.