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Plans for the New Year
Happy New Year. I hope you had a wonderful holiday season, and I wish you the very best in 2026. This year marks 90 years that Oakdale Electric Cooperative (OEC) has provided electric service to our surrounding communities. A lot has changed in 90 years since the first line was energized to bring power to the first members.
Members used to read their own meters, calculate, and pay their bills in person. Now meters are read automatically, computer systems calculate the amount owed, and bills are then emailed (and mailed). Many members then pay their bills via the internet through our website and SmartHub app. In the past, linemen had to read paper maps and climb poles to string wire across our counties. Now they have maps on iPads that give driving instructions to the outages (the outages also report automatically to our system) and can use bucket trucks to assist with building poles and wires instead of having to climb.
Another item that has changed recently is that OEC linemen are now able to build our own substations. In the past, Dairyland Power Cooperative, our G&T, owned and built our substations. This year our linemen built a new substation in Oakdale to help increase capacity in the grid to continue to provide reliable power to the members in this area. I am extremely proud of their accomplishment of doing this. They built this safely, quickly, and efficiently and exceeded all our expectations in doing this.
I would like to highlight a few of the projects that your board of directors approved at their last board meeting when they discussed our 2026 workplan and budget.
Construction: Construction will start on a new substation in the Armenia area to increase power delivery and reliability. We are also making plans to increase capacity at our Tunnel City, Jack Pine, Plymouth, Sparta, and Tomah substations. This will help us to continue to provide reliable power in those areas.
Major line construction will take place in the Mauston, Kendall, Clearfield, and Clifton areas. There are also many other smaller areas that we will be working in to reduce the likelihood of outages during major storm events.
Unfortunately, material costs continue to increase but not at the pace that they have been. Lead times on most items are also reducing, however, some items still take over a year to get here. If you are planning on any new construction at your home or changes at your business, please let us know as soon as possible so that we can work with you to plan accordingly.
Technology Updates: In 2026, we plan to continue the upgrade of our end-of-life load management system with a newer system. There are many benefits to upgrading our load management system including being able to implement new control strategies to help with newer rate design. If you are on our load management system, you will be notified with a letter that we will be in your area and there will be a door hanger left at your home once the changeout has been completed.
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