IT is fair to say many Yanchep, Two Rocks and Eglinton residents are fed up with power outages.
Some Two Rocks residents say for years the frequent power outages were blamed on the build-up of salt.
Other Yanchep and Two Rocks residents say the cause of the frequent power outages is that even though many customers in the area now have underground power they are ultimately connected to the old system (overhead power) in Two Rocks.
After the power outage in mid-June Yanchep News Online asked Western Power what the cause of that outage had been.
Today, a Western Power spokeswoman said on Saturday, June 13, about 6000 customers in Yanchep and surrounds lost power due to a damaged switch.
“Western Power crews worked as quickly as possible to safely repair damage and all customers were restored within three hours,’’ she said.
Earlier this year Western Power said an outage affecting about 5000 customers in Yanchep and Eglinton on January 2 was caused by a high-voltage underground cable fault and was not related to network capacity or the connection of the Alkimos desalination plant to the Yanchep substation on the corner of Romeo and Wanneroo roads.
The spokeswoman said between Yanchep and Two Rocks, the network was a mix of infrastructure, which meant there was a possibility underground customers could experience disruptions when the overhead network was impacted.
Western Power said while underground power brings a range of benefits, there were areas where it was not feasible to underground due to various factors including rocky terrain, hard limestone and groundwater.
The City of Wanneroo has an Undergrounding of overhead power within the City of Wanneroo report coming before the council tonight.
Overhead power lines are found throughout the older areas of the city including Two Rocks, Yanchep, Quinns Rocks, Wanneroo, Koondoola, Girrawheen and Marangaroo.
The council report says Western Power’s current projections for the undergrounding of power to many of the outer metro area suburbs is likely to be 20 to 25 years and beyond.
The motion before the council invites Western Power representatives to present at a future City of Woman concept forum, further information and associated processes on the targeted underground power program (TUPP) and retrospective undergrounding project (RUP) and share their recent experiences including the different approaches adopted by other local governments.
The motion also requests the mayor and administration continue to advocate, on behalf of residents serviced by overhead power supply, for Western Power to undertake urgent power upgrades by bringing forward the undergrounding of power within the city and requests administration to undertake a business case and cost analysis to understand the feasibility and viability for the city to fund the RUP ahead of the TUPP.
- Yanchep News Online understands the power outage last night (June 22) was caused by a third-party excavation damaging underground assets in the vicinity of Peony Blvd.
