With more than 40,000 Nashville households and businesses still without power, Nashville Electric Service is facing intense scrutiny from the public and Nashville’s mayor, who says he “expects them to do better.” (This story was updated at 6:45 p.m. on Saturday.)
On Saturday, NES announced it has more than 1,100 line workers in the field from seven different states and it unveiled an improved web site with real time information about where work is being done and estimated dates that power will be restored by zip code.
But Mayor Freddie O’Connell is not satisfied with the pace of power restoration.
He sent a heated letter to NES leaders on Saturday afternoon, expressing frustration and summoning them to his office on Sunday for a full briefing. It reads in part:
“I have continued to commit the full force of the Metro government and partners beyond Metro to assist NES. If there are other resources NES needs or barriers we can clear for them, I expect a quick assessment from NES so we can resource them swiftly and with precision.
Nashvillians are justifiably angry. It is critical to the life, safety, and wellbeing of our residents that NES use every tool at their disposal to increase the pace, improve communication, and get Nashvillians’ power back on.”
Also on Saturday, U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn sent a letter to NES’ CEO demanding accountability about the utility’s lack of preparedness for the winter storm.
REPORTED FRIDAY:
In return, NES has promised more information sharing and said even larger crews would be out over the weekend.
On Friday afternoon, the utility said it hoped to have an improved real-time website that will detail where crews are working, with updates down to the individual customer level. The website could be live around 9 p.m. Friday night.
“Very soon we will have estimated restoration times for customers, and we hope that will help a lot and people planning their lives and their day to day activities,” said NES CEO Teresa Broyles-Aplin.
Communications to the roughly 200,000 households that have lost power since last weekend have been inconsistent and, at times, inaccurate. Faulty alerts have gone out telling people their power back on, only for them to return and find that it isn’t. And the utility has, thus far, been unable to provide customers with an estimate for when they will see power restored.
The latest: Storm updates from WPLN News
On Thursday, Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell urged NES transparency, “even if it’s bad news.” By Friday, he said he was unsatisfied with their communication efforts.
“I am not satisfied, have not been satisfied, and continue to expect them to do better,” O’Connell said. “Our communications team remains in close contact with their communications team … pressing them to share more, do more, offer more, show visualization, share data, talk about performance.”
Brent Baker, the chief customer and innovation officer at NES, agreed Thursday that the utility needs to provide more communication, but that workers need to first finish their assessment of the system. As of Thursday, that was roughly 80% complete.
“The one thing we don’t want to do is give inaccurate information, but we absolutely have to start giving more information, which is what we’re working on,” Baker told reporters. “We just have to get more done in the field to make that happen.”
‘Unprecedented’ damage
NES is challenged by the most devastation its system has ever seen, with thousands of trees downed and more than 360 poles damaged. Each pole replacement can take up to 10 hours for a crew.
The utility says it will have 1,700 personnel working Saturday, bolstered by state agencies and TVA.
At Friday’s press briefing, Brandon Whitlock with NES shared how this event is unlike any other.
“We’re having to dig our infrastructure out from under trees froze to the ground,” he said said. “It is a challenge for us to project that off of our history because it is unlike anything we’ve ever experienced.”
One reality: NES has still been assessing damage.
“That adds a complexity layer to, ‘How long is it gonna take?’” Whitlock said. “I don’t know how much it is, still.”
Workforce growing
Another existing tension is around line workers. There have been reports that NES has turned away help.
On Thursday, NES wouldn’t directly answer questions about whether they passed on some line workers. Instead, they said they have accepted help from hundreds of contractors, but that, for safety purposes, they follow a specific vetting process to make sure they are accepting only skilled workers.
And the CEO clarified Friday that the vetting process has nothing to do with unionization.
““The allegation that we are not a union friendly shop is not true at all,” Broyles-Apline said. “NES does not have a problem with union workers.”
Two strongly worded statements from employee unions (Tennessee AFL-CIO and IBEW) say reports that union crews were turned away are “false.”
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