MEMPHIS, Tenn. —
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) spent nearly $123 million in 2023 to prepare for winter weather.
In 2022, TVA had to implement rolling blackouts as it supplied more power from Dec. 23 to Dec. 24 than any other time in its history.
Seretha Currie lived in Downtown Memphis in 2022. She said she never lost power, so her friends and family members had to come to her home for warmth and hot meals.
“It was way too cold to have your power out. But we had an open door for everybody at my house. At least familywise and close friends-wise,” said Currie.
In 2023, TVA said it prepared for the winter by having its employees complete nearly 3,400 readiness tasks. That included adding enclosures around exposed equipment, modernizing heat trace technology to supply real-time data to alert technicians and insulating exposed pipes. Employees also trained for extreme weather events.
“We're not sitting back and saying we didn't have any problems. We want to make sure we're doing everything possible to continue to safe-guard our generation and be able to provide power to the valley,” said Site Plant Manager Mike Cashon.
“I want to assure the TVA customer. We take it very seriously," said Maintenance Manager Erich Taylor. "We've even went above and beyond on some of our shelters. Anything that we thought could put our customers at risk, we've mitigated. We've taken care of it.”
In the 2024 fiscal year beginning on Oct. 1, TVA is committed to spending an additional $120 million to enhance its generation fleet.