Lansdale hints at regional power partnership

Town leaders have been introduced to a potential new approach that could give Lansdale and surrounding towns a bigger voice in ways of providing electricity.

“The Q-P-H-L Energy Corridor: Quakertown, Perkasie, Hatfield, and Lansdale. These are four municipalities that all have municipal-owned electric, that are in the local vicinity,” said councilman Andrew Carroll.

“The thought of this is to potentially create a resilience within our own corridor, so we can essentially handle our own power distribution and creation … while still having backstops with our larger partners,” he said.

In recent years Lansdale’s staff and their electric committee, which Carroll chairs, have discussed ways the town can prepare for anticipated steep hikes in the costs of electricity the town buys wholesale and sells back to residents, and ways to keep the electric rates charged by the borough at or below those charged by the much larger PECO and PPL utilities that supply much of the region.

Tactics tried and discussed so far have included calls for cuts in power consumption at peak hours, installation and operation of two municipal solar power arrays that went live in early 2021, ways to encourage similar solar arrays by private businesses, and study of new solar setups on other borough properties.

The town has also extended its current wholesale supply contract to lock in current rates before any hikes.  An electric rate study currently underway is meant to examine whether current rates cover all costs the town incurs, for both the ongoing supply and demand of power plus the replacement of infrastructure such as transformers, switch gear and meters.

    Lansdale Electric crews work to stabilize power lines on Spring Avenue, where two utility poles snapped due to heavy storms on Wednesday, April 3 2024. (Credit: Lansdale Electric)
  

Regional advantage

During his electric committee report on Feb. 5, Carroll reported on a new option: the regional grouping of four similar towns, all facing similar issues, that could give them all a greater voice in negotiations or in larger projects.

“This is very much in its infancy, and it’s something we were asked to be a part of at the ‘listen and learn’ phase that we’re at now,” Carroll said.

“I don’t think we know of any other municipalities that are working on anything like this,” he said.

Early talks and study so far has been grant-funded, and no formal actions are requested of the group yet. Council will be kept informed before any larger commitment, Carroll added.

“It’s something that could be really interesting in the next five to ten years. It’s looking to get substantial amounts of grant money out there, at a minimum cost to the municipalities. I’m sure there are going to be private partners, too,” he said.

“There are a lot of moving pieces, but the independence it could give us in the long term, could be dramatic,” Carroll said.

    The Lansdale Electric Services Building on Ninth Street is seen in summer 2021.
 By Dan Sokil | The Reporter   

Mayor weighs in

Mayor Garry Herbert gave more detail in a Mayoral Musings column after the meeting, outlining what he termed the ‘Regional Resilient Corridor Project’ and how it could benefit each of the four towns.

“At its core, this project connects four municipal utilities — Lansdale, Hatfield, Perkasie, and Quakertown — through a resilient electrical infrastructure designed to withstand power disruptions and support long-term economic growth,” he said.

“By leveraging state-of-the-art microgrid technology and a mix of renewable energy sources, this corridor will ensure that our community remains powered even during extreme weather events and unforeseen outages,” Herbert said.

The four towns could connect to each other via what he termed “robust, weather-resistant underground cables” along existing rail lines, and could incorporate energy generation like solar panels and storage methods like batteries to help the four shift power quickly if a facility goes out.

“Instead of depending on an aging, patchwork grid where a problem in one area might leave any one of us in the dark, this system creates a sort of ‘community backup’ that can share power among the boroughs,” he said.

“Under normal conditions, it delivers electricity reliably and efficiently, but if a storm or outage hits one part, the other areas can help keep the lights on by isolating the problem and providing support,” Herbert said.

More in the works

Several other projects and ongoing initiatives were also discussed by the electric committee, including an accreditation apprentice program for linemen that could help train future employees, an update to the town’s electric ordinance meant to modernize language and clarify customer versus borough responsibilities, purchase of a new electric vehicle for the department, and a presentation slated for March on a plan from the town’s environmental advisory commission to commit Lansdale to using 100 percent renewable energy.

“Their goal for us would be to have us go to completely renewable energy, which I think is a wonderful sentiment. We’ll see what the practicality looks like,” Carroll said.

Lansdale’s borough council next meets at 7 p.m. on Feb. 19 and the electric committee next meets at 7:30 p.m. on March 5, both at the borough municipal building, 1 Vine Street. For more information visit www.Lansdale.org.

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