Archive for year: 2019

By Amy Higgins and Erin Campbell

While the threat of cybersecurity attacks on the electric grid gets a lot of attention these days, physical damage from storms or critters is much more likely to disrupt power. There are many physical threats to our power delivery system that Colorado’s electric cooperatives work hard to manage on a daily basis. Because weather events such as snowstorms, tornadoes and hail, as well as criminal activity, including copper theft and shooting at a substation, can occur, it takes proactive commitment to consistently deliver reliable service. Even something as small as a squirrel can damage infrastructure and cause power outages.

“We prepare for a potential threat by ensuring that all of our systems are regularly patched, by eliminating legacy and unsupported systems/equipment, by providing in-depth end user training, by staying informed of potential exploitations/vulnerabilities that are happening around the globe and by continually evaluating, hardening and securing our infrastructure,” explains Heather Romero, manager of information technology at Empire Electric Association in Cortez.

Part of the community
One of the most valuable things about being served by an electric co-op is that you also have an ownership stake in the way the cooperative operates. Electric co-ops know their communities — cooperative employees live and work in the neighborhoods and towns they serve. You know many of your co-op’s board members and employees and, in turn, board members and employees are personally acquainted with or are a part of fire departments, county supervisor boards, emergency medical technician crews and more.

“WREA believes in the cooperative business model and the important role that our members play in that ‘biz’ model. We are our members; their participation and support is key to our success,” says Trina Zagar-Brown, general counsel and manager of member services at White River Electric Association in Meeker.

Emergencies can happen at any time, and these relationships in and around the co-op’s communities are important when urgently responding to unplanned events or in preparing for more predictable events, including winter storms or summer flooding. For example, when tornadoes roared into Morgan County Rural Electric Association’s territory in the Fort Morgan area in 2018, crews from Akron-based Y-W Electric Association responded by assisting MCREA with power restoration efforts. That’s because they’re part of one large cooperative community, and cooperation among cooperatives is an essential principle of providing reliable electric service.

Planning, preparing and practicing
There is a well-known saying: “It’s not if a crisis will occur, but when it will occur.” Electric co-ops test disaster and business continuity plans regularly and take pride in being prepared at all times. Plans not only focus on how to prevent threats, but also how to respond and recover in the event of an incident.

Shane McGuinness, Systems Administrator at Gunnison County Electric Association in Gunnison, says guidelines and tabletop exercises are the most effective way to prepare for an array of cyber threats. “Tabletop exercises act like a practice and can highlight important factors, when preparing for threats, such as communication,” he says. “When practicing … we include many local entities to create a realistic scenario. Many of our personnel will provide training and receive training from entities around the state to help build a robust group that is ready to adapt to fight any threat.”

GCEA’s cybersecurity practices include using existing scenarios to help identify how adversaries may attack. For example, the co-op thoroughly studied Russia’s attack on the Ukrainian power grid in 2015 and uses that information to help prepare for such a threat.

Electric co-ops place a high importance on partnerships with fellow cooperatives, industry partners and government agencies to mitigate the potential impacts of all types of threats to your electric cooperative. Electric cooperatives work closely with the rest of the electric industry, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, the U. S. Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. Department of Energy and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on matters of critical infrastructure protection — that includes sharing necessary information about potential threats and working together to avoid disruptions to the extent possible.

MCREA utilizes the services of the National Information Solutions Cooperative for its cybersecurity protection. “We felt it pertinent to partner with a trusted resource that is able to provide a layer of protection via sophisticated software and active 24/7/365 monitoring of our computer systems,” explains MCREA Office Services Manager Robb Shaver. “Not only do they provide protection on a daily basis, [but] they also are in tune with any new/immediate threats that may arise on a moment’s notice.”

“Cooperatives frequently share knowledge and their best practices for many issues, including cybersecurity,” explains Kelli Root, IT manager at Yampa Valley Electric Association, which operates out of Steamboat Springs and Craig. “At a recently attended Colorado regional IT conference, various training options, availability security testing and protective options were discussed and have proved to be helpful. Technology is always changing and, therefore, security issues will also be changing.”

Your electric co-op is vigilant in ensuring protection from physical and cyber threats in order to power your lives. “We would like to encourage our members to always stop and think before acting,” says Drew Timmerman, IT supervisor at Durango-based La Plata Electric Association. Timmerman implores consumer-members to question any email, web browser pop-ups or phone calls with a sense of urgency to “fix” your computer or an account. “For example, we never email or call our members threatening to disconnect their electric service if they don’t immediately pay over the phone. If something doesn’t feel quite right, it’s likely a scam.”

“We also want our members to understand we have board policies in place to protect paper and electronic personal identifying information from unauthorized access, use, modification, disclosure or destruction,” McGuinness explains. “As the future goes on, we continue ongoing cybersecurity training to ensure the well-being of our members and power delivery system is held to its highest standard.”

Whether it is protecting consumer-members from a snowstorm-caused outage, a squirrel in a substation or a scammer, Colorado’s electric cooperatives are always evolving, staying up to date on how to best combat threats to their communities, because your electric co-op is vigilant about protecting you, its consumer-members.

Amy Higgins is a long-time freelance writer for Colorado Country Life. Erin Campbell is the Director of Communications at Iowa Association of Electric Cooperatives.

By Derrill Holly, National Rural Electric Cooperative Association

Three to four generations of monarch butterflies migrated to their summer ranges last spring. Now, a single generation is returning to its wintering grounds only to begin the first leg of the 2020 migration early next year.

“We call them the super generation,” said Mara Koenig, of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “They live for about eight months, overwintering down in Mexico and waiting for the right conditions to return to their U.S. range in the spring.”

According to Koenig, communications coordinator for FWS’s Monarch Butterfly/ Pollinator Program, the largest migration of butterflies makes a 3,000-mile journey to Mexico from states south of the Great Lakes and east of the Rocky Mountains. A smaller population migrates from Arizona and the Pacific Northwest toward the California Coast. The immature insects spend the next few months roosting and eating in super colonies in a phase called diapause, when their reproductive organs are not mature.

“They develop those organs as they’re migrating north for the spring,” Koenig said. “They’ll do their first round of life cycle around Texas, Oklahoma and the southern United States and then slowly move north with each life cycle.”

Milkweed makes the difference

The FWS estimates that there are 128 million monarch butterflies left in North America, including a non-migratory population in south Florida. Support for saving the species has grown in recent years, spurred by recognition of pollinator preservation and their symbolic value to environmental stewardship.

“Everybody can play a part in monarch butterfly conservation,” Koenig said. “It takes small, simple actions such as planting milkweed in a garden or even in a pot on your balcony, to having large swaths of landscapes that are conserved for pollinator habitats.”

While various flowering plants provide the necessary nectar needed for nourishment, milkweed is crucial to the species survival because it is the only plant capable of hosting developing caterpillars.

“The monarch caterpillar requires the milkweed plant to survive and go through its life cycle process before it can then migrate back down to Mexico for the winter,” Koenig said, adding that “the plants provide the energy needed to spin cocoons.”

Butterfly backers are out to change the image of milkweed, long considered a nuisance plant because it is poisonous to cattle, horses and other livestock. Because of that and the fact that it is difficult to control, it is excluded from windbreak and right-of-way plantings. But that is changing as efforts are made to balance the monarch butterfly’s need for milkweed with protecting livestock.

“We want to plant over one billion stems of milkweed throughout the monarch’s migratory range,” said Patrick Fitzgerald, senior director of community wildlife at the National Wildlife Federation. “It would provide enough habitat for the monarch to increase its numbers and reproduce.”

That spurred efforts to encourage gardeners to include ornamental milkweed varieties in landscapes and container gardens. Several colorful species can be cultivated and controlled to prevent them from overrunning garden space.

The NWF also partnered with the FWS and dozens of environmental and conservation groups on the promotion of monarch butterfly conservation initiatives.

Fitzgerald authored the Mayor’s Monarch Pledge, which serves as a blueprint for community action, recommending 25 steps groups and individuals can take to help support butterfly and other pollinators’ conservation.

“We encourage people to look at park systems, open spaces, rights of way, schools and other public and undeveloped areas where you could possibly plant and manage areas for monarchs,” Fitzgerald said. “We have a guide online, and we have webinars to help land managers choose seed mixes and understand what decisions they can make that will help the monarchs.”

How electric co-ops help

Keeping with the seventh cooperative principle of Concern for Community, electric cooperatives across the country are embracing pollinator conservation.

Vegetation management programs, designed to help maintain the reliability of your electricity, have been adapted to help provide year-round pollinator habitats and food sources for migratory wildlife, including butterflies.

“We also need the other plants that the adult butterflies can use as a food source. They need nectar, so we need other types of plants throughout the range,” Fitzgerald said.

“All those blooming flowers that we see in the fall are a great source for them to fuel up,” Koenig said. “Making sure that those are available throughout the migratory range ensures that they have those reserves to go down to Mexico and wait out the winter, and enough reserves to start making that migration back north in the spring.”

Along utility pole lines near roadside ditches, across expanses of rural rights of way and on the grounds of electric substations, power plants and solar arrays, electric cooperatives are working with community groups to make open space even more nature friendly.

In the spring of 2019, Poudre Valley Rural Electric Association in Fort Collins hosted a Plant Day with Colorado State University Extension where the electric co-op invited Resurrection Christian School high school students to help plant pollinator-friendly seeds at the cooperative’s Coyote Ridge Community Solar Farm. This project not only makes the solar farm more attractive to passersby, but also creates an appealing place for pollinators of several varieties.

“The more habitat that’s created, the more likely there is a possibility for the monarch butterfly population to recover to a resilient population,” Koenig said, noting that the goal is to reverse a decline first identified more than 20 years ago. “We’re creating habitats for monarch butterflies and for other pollinators, including grassland songbirds. Upland game birds and even waterfowl can benefit from this.”

Officials at the NWF agree. They’re particularly optimistic about the potential of partnerships with electric co-ops, other utilities, state and local transportation departments and railroad operators.

“They manage those strips of land that we would call wildlife corridors or monarch corridors,” Fitzgerald said. “When we plant more milkweed and more native flowers in these areas, it could make a big difference.”

Always committed to the Seven Cooperative Principles, this effort among electric cooperatives throughout the United States, including Colorado, is yet another example of how co-ops are showing concern for their communities.

Derrill Holly writes on consumer and cooperative affairs for the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association.