Board Meeting held on December 11, 2025

Staff presents system hardening projects

Efforts will continue to improve MPE's reliability and outage statistics

The board heard presentations by staff regarding ongoing efforts to harden MPE’s distribution system, including the recent drone monitoring project, the annual pole inspections, and the Construction Work Plan.

The grant-funded aerial field survey project represents the first time in MPE’s history that the entire overhead system has been examined for potential anomalies in a single season. Systems and Mapping (SAM) used specialized drone cameras to document 23,426 power poles and structures over approximately 1,146 miles from June to September. SAM staff shared positive feedback about MPE’s system and that the findings were what they would expect for a first-time aerial inspection.

Vice President of Operations Adam Paulson shared a project summary report from SAM. High resolution photographs and thermal imaging was captured from all four quadrants of each structure. A total of 6,586 anomalies were identified. Paulson said the Operations team is thoroughly examining the list and he anticipates ending up with a significantly  shorter list of items that require repair. Also, in coordination with Engineering, staff is producing an efficient plan for repairs taking into account findings from the pole inspections and the preparatory work being done for the fiber-to-the-home project by Conexon Connect. 

This year’s pole inspections focused on an area that included taps that cross wet areas and poles that may have been installed at the onset of our co-op’s electrification build-out across rural North Park. MPE’s annual pole inspections usually identify “reject” poles at a much lower rate than industry standards, likely due to our dry climate. This year, more than 200 poles were identified as needing to be replaced. As these poles are 50-70 years old, they well outlived the usual power pole life expectancy, but this will be a costly project.

Electric utilities have construction work plans and corresponding budgets to maintain and improve their distribution systems. MPE’s work plans over the past decade have focused on the construction of fiber and have been hindered by new construction, the East Troublesome Fire, and staff turnover. Current staff shared with the board ways it plans to prioritize and complete work plan projects that focus on maintaining our system for reliability and safety moving forward. Vice President of Engineering Susan Henderson shared that Stanley Consultants was recently awarded MPE’s long-range plan and construction work plan following an RFP process. MPE will be working with them in 2026 to get these plans completed.

Other Board Meeting Items

  • The board completed its review of donation requests from November and approved a $10,000 donation from the Unclaimed Capital Credits Fund to Grand Enterprise Initiative for 2026. Patrick Brower of Grand Enterprise Initiative offers free and confidential business management coaching.
  • In an update regarding MPE’s New ERA award, Member Relations staff shared that although the USDA workforce has been decreased, they are back and are processing grant paperwork following the federal government shutdown. Although the USDA is still not able to lock in a specific timeframe, MPE appears to be in a good position towards the head of the group of New ERA recipients to begin receiving funding.

View the December 2025 Board Meeting Bulletin PDF

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