$30M upgrade of a power plant is raising fears about scores of out-of-town employees massing in a control room.
Orlando’s utility is protecting electric and water service from the coronavirus outbreak by sealing off critical operations, but specialized personnel running power plants are being exposed to a stream of out-of-town contractors staying in hotels.
An Orlando Utilities Commission employee, not authorized to speak publicly and commenting only if not identified, said he was concerned that the arrangement threatens the continued operation of the Curtis Stanton Energy Center coal-powered generators in east Orange County.
The worker said there is a small group of personnel qualified to run OUC’s coal-powered electric plants. They are on duty around the clock in the confines of a windowless operator room crowded recently with contractors overhauling control equipment.
The worker said he and others worry that operator personnel could be exposed to a contractor employee ill with the virus but not showing symptoms. Exposure could lead to 14-day isolation periods for key personnel and leave OUC unable to continuously staff the control room, he said.
OUC spokesman Tim Trudell said a health questionnaire, asking about fever, respiratory ailment and travel, will be issued to all OUC and contract workers at Curtis Stanton Energy Center as soon as today.
“Prior to gaining access to one of Orlando Utilities Commissions (OUC) facilities, this questionnaire must be completed in full,” it states.
Also likely are temperature checks of OUC and contract workers at Stanton Energy Center, although the thermometers, personnel and protocols to do that are still being sought, Trudell said.
“We are very serious about this,” Trudell said.
Trudell said there is little risk of power shortages, with the utility seeing declines in the demand for electricity, resulting in part from major customers such as Universal Studios closing its doors.
As a contingency, the municipal utility has former powerplant controllers in management and elsewhere in the workforce who could be tapped to run the Stanton coal plants, Trudell said.
“Over the last few weeks, OUC has monitored the evolving situation, and actions have been implemented to minimize risk,” the utility said this week in a general statement to the community about its coronavirus response. “However, this is new for everyone and we are adapting to meet the needs of those we serve.”
The effort by OUC to ramp up protection of power-plant employees from the new coronavirus, COVID-19, has revealed vulnerabilities of an industry that otherwise touts robust preparation for hurricanes, fuel shortages, cyber terrorism and other disasters.
On Thursday, the utility sent its workforce an internal “Employee FYI,” stating that “OUC’s leadership team is currently working to finalize employee guidelines and policies specific to this coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.”
A wide range of industries are confronted with the uncertainties of how to protect their frontline employees – TSA workers, bus drivers and health-care providers among them – from infection.
With little planning or expertise for a pandemic, local response to the coronavirus has been at times strikingly inconsistent.
For example, the Orlando International Airport authority met Wednesday in a large room where the audience was limited to no more than 10 employees and visitors and chairs were spaced 6 feet apart.
However, a short walk from the meeting room, hundreds of travelers crowded together as they filed through the airport’s Transportation Security Administration checkpoints.
An Orlando airport TSA officer is among those in Central Florida confirmed to have been infected with COVID-19.
While the municipally owned OUC is spared from what many businesses are facing, a fight to survive financially, the power provider has the critical task of keeping the city’s lights on while relying on thin and evolving guidelines specific to a pandemic.
Central Florida’s largest electric utility, Duke Energy, mentions the threat of human disease once in its 533-page reliability report filed last month with the state’s Public Service Commission.
“Emergency response levels are generally associated with outages due to storms or other emergency situations,” the report states. “However, a large reduction of employees due to pandemic health outbreaks could also trigger these response levels.”
The Duke Energy report applies far more attention to disease affecting trees that could topple onto power lines.
Florida Power & Light Co.’s spokesman Bill Orlove said his utility has a pandemic response plan, though it is internal and not available for public scrutiny.
Duke’s spokeswoman Ana Gibbs, echoing OUC and FPL responses, said her utility has taken extra steps to protect workers “particularly at critical-operational facilities.”
Along with regular maintenance, much of the work being done by Orlando Utilities Commission on Unit 1 at the Stanton Energy Center was approved in 2017. It was launched this winter after the generator was turned off during the “shoulder season” of lower demand for electricity.
At that point, the coronavirus outbreak had not yet triggered widespread disruption in the U.S.
Costing nearly $30 million, the overhaul includes an upgrade of Unit 1’s steam turbine and its system that preheats air flowing into a giant boiler.
Also being revamped are the gauges, controls and monitors into a control designed for relatively few personnel.
As OUC technicians have continued to operate Unit 2 of the Stanton Energy Center, construction workers have been filing in and out the control room, handling switches, keyboards and other common surfaces. Trudell said the room is regularly disinfected.
Power-plant personnel and contractor employees also are sharing elevators providing access to the control room. Work is expected to last into next month.