April 24th 2017, Public Utilities Board meeting to order.
Our first item on our
agenda is to hold a public hearing regarding and consider
making a
recommendation to adopt a resolution for proposed
construction expansion and use
of a transmission power line located in Bernard and Eagle
Drive. So I thank
Brian is going to lead us in this the presentation.
All right good morning board members. I'd like to take just
a minute to give a
quick overview of this Eagle Locust transmission line
project to remind you
this is generally on the south side of town, south of
downtown and then southeast
of the University of North Texas campus. Those who were at
the public hearing
will be familiar with this graph that shows the load growth
in Denton over the
last 50 or 60 years. This is no surprise to anyone who's
been here any amount of
time as we've had new residents come in and new businesses
come into town. It's
certainly there's been a corresponding growth in the amount
of electricity we've
used. It's our responsibility as the electric provider in
town to anticipate
that growth and to plan for it to make sure that we have
good reliability and of
course this is nowhere as true as it is in this downtown
area where you've had
infill development and the University continues to grow. We
had an open house
on this project about a month ago and based on the
information and discussions
that we had in that meeting and also just looking at the
the facts of the
project DME recommends rebuilding this line in its existing
route and its
existing alignment. With that said we did propose an
alternative route and that's
certainly still a viable route so while we recommend one
and I'll give some
specific reasons for that recommendation none of that's to
say that the other
route isn't viable indeed it is. So here's the two routes
that we're
discussing and this connects the Locust substation which is
currently under
construction just just off this map to the to the right
there with the Eagle
substation which is soon to be constructed. You can see
that these two
routes share an alignment as they cross Carroll Boulevard
but then as they get to
Cleveland Street the yellow route goes up to the north and
along Eagle whereas
the blue route stays in its existing alignment going up
Bernard Street. There
are a few advantages to leaving it in its existing
alignment one of those is
certainly the landowners who are currently affected are
already affected
by it. They already see this in their in their area and
when I say
affected let me be clear we're not anticipating removing
any structures or
relocating any individuals as part of this project so the
the effect is more
aesthetic than anything. There are also fewer landowners
that will be affected by
that existing blue route it'll be 3 versus 11 on the on the
yellow route. Now
the one of the issues there is the more landowners we deal
with the longer it
would tend to take and the longer before the project was
completed. Fewer trees
would be removed on that blue route versus the yellow route
. Seven trees we
anticipate having to remove on the blue route and 25 on the
yellow route so
there's an advantage there and finally these two routes are
about the same
distance or right around 3,000 feet but nevertheless that
yellow route has a
couple of extra corner poles and there's a premium that
comes with those so we
expect a higher expense. Well unless otherwise directed we
'll plan to have a
public hearing in about a month from today with the City
Council and I'll put
that map back up in case you have any questions for me.
Okay any members have
questions Brian?
The just one question on the on the blue route the is there
an expanded easement
required? Yes sir that's that's a great question so this is
changing from a 69
to 138 KB and with that comes an expanded easement. Okay so
there'll be
some right-of-way acquisition there? Yes sir that's right.
For those property.
Either route we take will have to require easements. Okay
and the just to
click just to make sure the decision has been made to do
gas insulation at this
point. Yes sir. At the corner. That's correct the Eagle
substation we're
moving forward with the gas insulated substation. Okay.
That's right. Okay any
other questions? Thank you Brian appreciate it. We do have
one request to
speak Steve Stone is here Steve. Just state your name and
address into the
microphone please. Steve Stone I'm 6827 Freeman Road in Cr
um. Essentially I
represent the owner of this of the track at the substation
location. Have for the
entire time went through the previous hearings and so forth
that that actually
caused that that station to be selected. So I only signed
up to try to decide if
if I really wanted to say anything. I went to the meeting
and I thought that
the yellow route was the better route. But having to
establish new right away
the loss of new trees may mitigate that thought a little
bit. So you know I might
really be amenable in my mind. It doesn't matter to us who
have the the corner
substation it doesn't matter. It seems like to me it's more
I want to say
commercially applicable because you're going from what what
what is the the
size of a line going for up to 137. Okay I guess my only
thought and since none of
the residents are here no one else is here to speak for
them is that you're
going to increase that that electrical I guess radiation if
we should use that
word in this meeting. You're going to be even closer to
those those town homes
that are going to be right there along Collins. The ones on
Cleveland Street
sit back off of the road. I did understand there was an
additional
mitigated expense for probably an anchor corner post or
something to that effect.
So I guess I'm speaking on behalf of the general public at
this point but only to
say I think the yellow line is a if new acquisition has to
be acquired for the
blue line then I would think the yellow line would be more
applicable. It's at
least to live with if I live there you know hopefully there
'll be no puppies
being born with five legs or anything there. So being so
close to that line and
it's going to increase the radio effect if there is such a
thing. I know that I
was blessed to get with the sub to get blessed with a subst
ation almost in my
front yard out in Crum which I don't know what you guys
call that station out
there. What do you call that station out there? Not that
one the one way west.
Oh that's an encore substation. My apologies. Your
competitors slipped in
across the street from a piece of land that I like a lot.
Part of my my rural
homestead but anyway we hear the hum at night you know and
I know there's going
to be some effect that this is going to have on this
neighborhood. So I think the
only thing I can really say without saying really anything
this is going to
affect a neighborhood. So do anything possible to possibly
mitigate and
reduce the effect that it would have on personal lives.
That's pretty much it.
Okay. Thank you. Any questions? Yeah. That's what I was
gonna say. Any questions?
No. Thank you. No thank you. Thanks for coming down. Okay
is there anyone else I don't
see anyone else from the public for comments but I'll go
ahead and make the
ask and I'll ask again if there are any other comments from
the public that so
seeing none and we have no other cards for request to speak
or indication of
for against or so we will close the public hearing portion
of this agenda
item and comments from the utilities board members. Still
no comment. All right
then is there is there a recommendation to make an action
to make recommendation
to the council on which of these which of these routes
would be we feel be best.
I'd recommend to go with the blue. It's impacting the few
est people. It's the
lowest cost and it doesn't cut down as many trees so that I
would move to go
with that recommendation. Second. Okay so we have a motion
and a second that we
make a recommendation that the blue route be chosen as a
route of the
transmission line. Any discussion on that? Comments? Nope.
Hearing none all in favor
say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Same sign. Okay thank you.
Okay next item we have is our consent agenda. We have looks
like five items on
the consent agenda. Items ABC D&E. Is there any member who
'd like to pull any
of these items for individual consideration?
No. Hearing none then is there a motion to approve the
consent agenda as
presented? Move approval. We have a motion from Barbara.
Second. Second from Susan. Any
discussion? Hearing none all in favor say aye. Aye. Any
opposed? Same sign. Okay at
this time we have an item for a closed meeting so we will
go into closed
meeting at looks like it's about 12 minutes after 9 and ask
everybody
anybody who is does anything to do with the items being
presented
at 936 and under items for individual individual
consideration item a is to
consider approval of the public utilities board meeting
minutes of April
10th 2017. These have been distributed in advance and would
ask if there's
any comments questions changes to those minutes. Move
approval. That's okay but I
appreciate the thought. Hearing none those will be approved
as submitted then. Item
item B is to consider recommending to the City Council the
adoption of an
ordinance authorizing the City Manager or his designee to
execute an amendment
to the energy trading risk management contract with ABB V
intex. Yes Dr. Lance
Cunningham will present that.
So we're here to discuss the ABB Vintex energy trading risk
management contract
amendment approval. The current system that we have for
energy trading risk
management software we purchased in June of 2014 and it was
procured through a
competitive bidding process. In January the council
provided direction for the
renewable dentin plan to move to 70% so it's you know
considerable time later.
The existing system is not flexible enough or robust enough
for us to
utilize when we move to our renewable dentin plan. The
reason is is because of
the protocol requirements with ERCOT whenever we have our
wind assets and our
solar assets we have operationally have to do a lot of
changes, hourly changes
and the existing system is just not flexible enough to be
able to handle
that variability. Are there any questions over that?
Because of this the staff is
recommended that the Public Utilities Board consider
recommendation
authorizing the City Manager to amend the contract between
the City of Denton
and ABB Vintex. Questions? The was there a second slide in
there? That's all of
this. Okay so I thought we had the the one that had the the
savings and the
cost and the continued cost. Page three. Oh I'm sorry I
skipped a page.
My apologies. Once we move to the renewable dentin plan we
'll have a much
larger volume of transactions because of the way the
variability of the wind and
solar assets will be coming in and in working with with ABB
Vintex there's
the existing software we have now is an older piece of
software. They do not
anticipate spending any more development dollars to bring
that up to kind of more
of a modern standard. They're developing a different
product that they're going
to utilize so in working with them and having conversations
with them over
the last three years it's it's become evident it's just not
going to meet our
needs moving forward. This software is our system of record
for all of our
transactions and the best analogy I can come up with is it
's very similar to JD
Edwards that the city uses for its accounting system. That
's the city's
official you know system of record for all of our financial
s and this is the
EMO system of record for transactions and related financial
s. The original
contract price was 1.6 million and what we've paid to date
is 971,000. The cost
to amend the contract or shorten the contract terminate it
whatever the term
you'd like to use there is $204,000. The savings so if you
take the the 971 and
add the 204 that we would continue to pay then that
approximately 1.1 million
compared to that 1.6 it'd be 443. So that's that's where
the saving comes
from and out of the 204 it's probably important to point
out that of that six
months of that would be it's a prorated share of the annual
fee. We currently pay
about 280 thousand dollars so 140 of the 204 is just what
we would have spent
anyway it's just a six month prorated share. Questions on
that? Comments? Just to
clarify so we're getting value for the 204,000. Yes ma'am.
We're getting value.
Yes ma'am. We will continue to use that software until a
replacement is
implemented. Thank you. Yes ma'am. Okay thank you. That's
good. Thanks for making
that. Any other questions? Okay. Is there a recommendation
or motion on this on
this agenda? Adam? I'll move approval. I second. Motion
from Susan and second from
Charlie to approve and recommend we do this amendment. Any
discussion? All in
favor say aye. Any opposed? Same sign. Okay thank you.
Thank you for your
consideration. Thank you. All right item number item C is
the ACM update and we
have the comparisons of employment metrics for water,
wastewater and also
DME attached. Questions on that? Comments? I appreciate
seeing that done. It took me
a little bit to follow it because there's a lot of
information there but I
was very pleased and thank you so much. I know staff worked
a lot on that and I
appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah it's hard it's hard to
bring apples, bananas
and kiwi and make them look all look like oranges. I
understand that and no
utility looks the same and so that that's a difficult part.
You can't just
look at the raw look at the raw numbers and make a draw
really a very well very
good conclusion but anyway. I'd like to just make you also
aware that we're
planning a same similar report for solid waste. It wasn't
quite ready at the time
we wanted to go ahead and get this information to you so to
the point from
the last meeting we're going to provide that as well. It
should be coming next
meeting. Okay thank you. Okay we also have the new business
metrics. Any additions to that? Any member would like to
make? Okay if not
then we have concluding items to come before the board. If
not is there a
motion to adjourn? Motion by Lillia. Second? By Charlie.
All in favor say aye.
Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. Thanks guys.