Eugene Water & Electric Board (EWEB)

EWEB commemorated the completion of the rebuilding of the Currin Substation with a ribbon cutting. ?? We invited special guests to learn how a substation works and how the new substation will be upgraded to meet future demand and modern seismic resiliency. Substations change, or "step down," high-voltage electricity from power generation stations to levels that can be safely distributed to homes and businesses. EWEB is known for its "resilient electric spine," comprising 38 substations. The system's redundancy in substations ensures that customers receive reliable power despite unexpected equipment failures. That's why rebuilding the Currin Substation, considered EWEB's "Grand Central Station," was a major priority. Built in 1962 during Eugene's rapid expansion, the Currin Substation feeds power from transmission lines owned by the Bonneville Power Administration and PacifiCorp to EWEB’s grid. It also connects transmission lines to the Hayden Bridge water filtration plant and to Eugene’s downtown electrical network. EWEB engineers, field staff, and contractors have spent the past two years rebuilding the substation from the ground up to maintain electric reliability and meet modern standards. The Currin Substation is just the first of several substations scheduled for a major rebuild over the next ten years as part of EWEB's major infrastructure investments for rehabilitating, replacing and installing new infrastructure. Thank you, EWEB Commissioners, Eugene City Councilor Randall B. Groves, EFO, and City Council President Matt Keating, City of Eugene Government Emergency Management Zoe Rolly-Keef, Eugene Mayor Lucy Vinis, and Senator James I. Manning Jr. for joining us for the celebration. #EWEB #Eugene #Electricreliability #Resiliency

How do fifth graders view electricity? ?? We asked students from across our service territory to illustrate the theme “Powered by EWEB” for our annual Public Power Week Poster Contest. EWEB received 185 stellar submittals, where staff narrowed the posters down to the top 20. Customers, social media followers, and those who attended EWEB's Truck-or-Treat Event voted for the top five to receive awards. And the winners are: ?? First Place: Chloe, Walterville Elementary, Springfield Public Schools (Oregon) ?? Second Place: Lane, Walterville Elementary ?? Third Place: Ben and Frances, Edison Elementary, 4J School District ?? Fourth Place: Juniper, Camas Ridge Community School, 4J School District ?? Fifth Place: Mimi, Camas Ridge Community School Our first-place winner illustrated how electricity powers the devices she uses in daily life. Other awardees show how electricity is used to take care of their pets, power kitchen appliances, and illuminate imagined cityscapes. Public Power Week is an annual celebration of customer-owned, community-powered utilities like EWEB. Because of our ownership structure, all decisions at EWEB are made with the community in mind. Please join us in congratulating our award winners and talented participants with a round of applause! ?? #EWEB #Eugene #PPW #PublicPowerWeek

Congrats to EWEB’s Heather Leanne Brown, who was nominated and selected as a 2024 winner for Eugene’s Outstanding Women in Business! Heather is a hydroplant operator and electrician at EWEB. She overcame childhood poverty and proved her doubters wrong by working hard to make a career in the trades. “Since joining IBEW 659 and EWEB, I have received nothing but acceptance and respect regardless of gender, tattoos, piercings or my style,” Heather told What’s Happening in Eugene. “I’m surrounded by talented and respectful people who inspire me to be my best, give back to the community, and I want my appreciation for my experiences in the last three years to show in my participation,” Heather added. “I hope that I’m able to inspire youth who may be struggling at home and can’t see themselves going to college to consider joining a trade and union.” She is proud of altering perceptions about women in the trades and wants to pave the way for other women to make it in the trades. Her message for the community is that “Everyone brings something to the table, particularly when they are accepted and appreciated.” Read the interview: https://lnkd.in/gwe6nxuW

The magic of Halloween came early at EWEB as we held our first-annual Truck-or-Treat customer and crew appreciation event on October 25. ?? 1,200 people, including customer and crew families, came together under sunny skies at our Roosevelt Operations Center?to gather candy and marvel at our fantastic fleet. Twelve of EWEB’s community-owned fleet vehicles were decorated for the event. One of our large bucket trucks was transformed into a dragon, a backhoe into Bob the Builder, and a dump truck took on a harvest theme for photo ops. Even with all these decorations, we kept to tight budget and put on the whole event for less than 3 cents per customer. Each truck was paired with a poster describing its purpose and role in the fleet. The posters also included snapshots of crew members who work around the clock to keep water and electricity flowing to homes. EWEB employees went above and beyond during the event; some even costumed to match the trucks where they were handing out candy. Other EWEB families came to see their parents' workplace and trucks. Families from within the organization and our community left with sugar-filled happy memories of EWEB, and we cannot wait to do it again next year! #EWEB #Eugene #Halloween

SHAKE OUT. DON'T FREAK OUT! EWEB participated in the worldwide ShakeOut drill with over 500,000 other Oregonians last week. EWEB staffers across the utility participated in the drill, received test emergency notifications (text, email, and call), and practiced evacuating the building. This annual drill helps the people at EWEB prepare for the BIG ONE, the Cascadia Subduction Zone Earthquake.

Congratulations are in order! ?? Kelly E. Hoell, climate policy analyst and advisor, and Ben Ulrich, lead energy resource analyst, recently graduated from the Western Energy Institute’s Business Acumen for Emerging Leaders (WEI BAEL) program. The BAEL program is a nine-month leadership and industry training program specifically designed for the energy industry. During the program, teams develop a presentation that they deliver to a room full of executives at the WEI Annual Meeting. Kelly’s team presentation was titled?“Electrification & Equity: Will we get it right?” It focused on how electrification is not happening uniformly across service territories, but utilities, as natural monopolies, still have an obligation to serve all customers. Her presentation used EWEB as a case study for bringing equity considerations into the program design and incentive program structure for things like the transition to electric mobility. ? Ben’s capstone team presentation, “Forecasting the Future: Weather Predictions in Utility Operations,” emphasized the growing significance of weather and climate forecasting in the electric and gas utility sectors. The presentation underscored how utilities increasingly rely on accurate weather data for operations, resource planning, and infrastructure investments. ? EWEB could not be more proud. Please join us in congratulating Kelly and Ben! ?? #EWEB #Graduates #WesternEnergyInstitute #BAEL

"As a new EWEB member and a trained emergency management professional, one of the things that's so exciting to me is to see the actual commitment by this organization. That is a commitment to life. This is a long-term investment to the resiliency of these communities." - Jenny Demaris Jenny Demaris started with EWEB just two months ago, but her emergency management experience and enthusiasm were evident at our recent Emergency Water Station Demonstration, where she took a leading role. The video showcases the ribbon-cutting and station demonstration event held for our sixth Emergency Water Station at Amazon Park, which was built in partnership with the City of Eugene and Eugene Family YMCA. These stations allow Eugene residents to access water in case a natural disaster, such as an earthquake, damages the pipelines. EWEB’s Emergency Water Stations have the capacity to provide two gallons of water per person per day to everyone in Eugene during an emergency. As Jenny described, this has been a long-term investment and a worthy one. Thank you, Jenny, for your thoughtful insights and resiliency expertise. We are happy to have you on board! ?? #EWEB #EmergencyPreparedness #Resiliency #Eugene #Oregon

It's the last day of September and National Preparedness Month. We've posted at-home tips, shared information about our resiliency projects, and even hosted a local emergency water demonstration event! However, making a plan and building an emergency kit takes time. This is why we built our ?award-winning? Pledge to Prepare Program, a 12-month blueprint for emergency preparedness. ?? The Pledge to Prepare is a monthly email with step-by-step recommendations to help prepare yourself, your home, and your family for an emergency. Even if you don't check off every item on the list, each step gets you more prepared. Take a moment to check it out: https://www.eweb.org/p2p We are particularly proud of our Pledge to Prepare Program because it won an award at the Northwest Public Power Association's NIC (Northwest Innovations in Communications) Conference this fall. EWEB has been running this program for a few years now, and we are overjoyed that the program was acknowledged. It is almost as nice as hearing that customers have their emergency kits stocked and ready to go! ?? #EmergencyPreparedness #emergencyprep #npm2024 #award

Thank you, Robyn Smith, for representing and presenting for EWEB at the Northwest Public Power Association's NIC (Northwest Innovations in Communications) Conference in Boise, Idaho. ?? We are proud of your presentations centered around utilizing short-form videos and Next Door as a public agency, and we look forward to hearing more insights and creative ideas shared by our fellow public utilities at the conference. Also, congratulations to the Communications Team for winning two awards this year: ?? First Place for our Pledge-to-Prepare Program ?? Third Place for our "Electricity in Eugene Costs less than $6/day" video A round of applause is in order! ?? ?? ??

At EWEB, safety is a core value. Last week, we invited our employees to attend our 2024 Safety and Health Expo for a day focused on safety. The conference-style expo featured presentations and classes, health screenings, health and safety vendors, and a thought-provoking and engaging keynote provided by Garrison Wynn,. The expo encouraged conversation and connection across departments while reinforcing EWEB's culture of safety. We count that as a success. Thank you to the employees who attended and are working to keep yourself and your coworkers safe. Our work helps our community stay safe. #CoreValue #Safety #Health #Culture