Tennessee public power utility Bolivar Energy Authority recently completed a fiber to home project by installing fiber throughout its entire service area.
“This project has been beneficial in two ways,” said Tony Kirk, President and CEO of BEA, in a Q&A with Public Power Current. “One, it helps us provide better service for our customers, and two, it also improves our communication.”
He noted that BEA has an OMS system map that provides data on outages “which helps us to reduce the length of outages. We are utilizing fiber to attach to all our SCADA devices including our electric meters.”
“BEA has fiber that now covers our entire system. In doing so, we are leasing space to an Internet Service Provider to bring high speed internet to our rural service area,” he went on to say.
“At this time, 41% of our customer base now has high speed internet and it is available to all customers in our service area. Even though this project was a major undertaking, we moved forward knowing without fiber access for businesses and homes our community would not experience growth which would make it difficult for the community to survive. We knew this was critical for the well-being of our customers and their families,” Kirk said.
BEA serves Hardeman County and parts of Fayette, Chester, Madison counties and Benton County in Mississippi. It serves a total of 11,221 electric customers. It covers 1,350 miles of power line with an average of 8 customers per mile.
Meanwhile, in 2023, BEA, along with Silicon Ranch Corporation and the Tennessee Valley Authority, brought online a new solar farm in Hardeman County, Tennessee.
Detailing the benefits that are flowing from this solar project to BEA and its customers, Kirk said the main benefit for BEA and its customers is the lower cost of power.
“We signed a long-term agreement with Silicon Ranch for a lower power cost. It is saving our rate payers $225,000 a year in power costs,” he said.
“We serve 300 homes off the solar power which reduces our demand cost due to TVA. It was a win for our county in extra property taxes due to the fact Silicon Ranch pays for the property. We have also offered it as a recruiting tool for industry by saving some Renewal Energy Credits to be used in recruitment. All in all, it has been a huge success for BEA, ratepayers, and Hardeman County.”
As President and CEO of BEA, Kirk oversees all day-to-day operations of BEA. “I have two people groups of which I consider top priority among my responsibilities, our electric customers, and my employees.”
The main goal for BEA “is to provide reliable power and keep rates as low as possible. My staff and I are continually looking for ways to use funds effectively in order to keep down our costs, which in turn helps to keep rates as low as possible. As President/CEO I am constantly evaluating our benefits and work environment to help with employee retention.”
