Altus Air Force Base News

 

Western Farmers Electrical Cooperative provides generator for Altus AFB

  • Published
  • By U.S. Air Force story by Airman 1st Class Megan E. Acs
  • 97th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs
ALTUS AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. --  Altus AFB hosted a ribbon cutting for a new 9-megawatt generator, July 13.

The ribbon cutting followed many months of installation and testing, and was first put to use May 2.

The generator, comprised of 15 smaller generators, is collectively known as an interactive distributed generation system, and was given to Altus AFB by Western Farmers Electrical Cooperative.

The generator system cost roughly $4 million, but cost Altus AFB nothing upfront.
WFEC provides electricity to 22 cooperatives in addition to Altus AFB. With rising demands for power, a more effective electricity delivery method was required to handle the power demands during peak load hours.

A peak load is the most power any one entity uses at one time.

Altus typically reaches its peak load during the summer months, when the air conditioners are turned on around base. The peak load may also be reached during months of extreme cold.

"On a year like this, we're not hitting our peak load because it's cool, the grass is green, it's raining, so our peak load is down this year," said Heath Sirmons, 97th Civil Engineer Squadron chief of optimization. "During 2012, when we were in the middle of the drought and there were 100 days of over 100 degrees, we were hitting that peak load every day."

The primary benefit to the generator system was to delay the building of additional multi-million dollar transmission lines.

WFEC found it to be more cost effective to provide Altus AFB with the generators, effectively removing the base from the current transmission lines during the peak load hours, which reduces the load demands on the older power cables. This in turn means the current transmission lines can handle the demand and remain untouched.

A secondary benefit of this is that -- excluding base housing, which has received its power through a private company since 2007-- Altus AFB now has a dependable source of electricity in the event of a crisis.

When Altus AFB was hit by an ice storm January 28, 2010, it lost power for nine days. Employees were sent home with pay, and simulator training came to a halt. The ordeal cost the base roughly $500,000 per day.

"Western Farmers Electrical Cooperative and the 97th Air Mobility Wing have been in coordination with this project since the ice storm of 2010," said U.S. Air Force Col. Todd Hohn, 97th Air Mobility Wing commander. "Because of this partnership, the 9-megawatt interactive distributed generator system is going to ensure that we mitigate any future scenarios where power could be interrupted in any way."

Altus AFB only pays for the electricity capabilities of the new generators during times when commercial power is not available. Running the generators during these events is significantly less expensive.

"With the new generators, thanks to the partnership with WFEC, Altus AFB now has reliable power during any event," said Sirmons.

WFEC has been in existence since February 1941, and the current Altus contract with WFEC is dated 14 February, 1956. The current power reliability from WFEC is 99.98 percent, excluding natural disasters.

"It's reassuring for the wing leadership to know that we have this fantastic capability available to us, should the need ever arise," said Hohn.