Typically, utilities prioritize feeders because they serve a greater number of customers. But failing to invest in laterals is problematic because as many as 80% of overhead faults occur on lateral lines. Not investing in laterals is negatively impacting your overall system performance and creating headaches for customers in our always-online society. When widespread outages do occur, such as after storms, customers on remote lateral lines are often the last ones to be restored. Normally, utilities restore feeders first, which can often bring 90% of customers back online within hours. That restoration time can balloon to days or weeks for those serviced by lateral lines.

S&C’s suite of smart devices provides you advanced end-to-end lateral automation. TripSaver® II Cutout-Mounted Reclosers and VacuFuse® II Self-Resetting Interrupters bring fault-testing to lateral lines and address customers suffering from repeated outages at the grid edge. By incorporating these devices into your fault-management strategy, you can keep temporary faults from becoming sustained outages and even apply segmentation to lateral lines.

The TripSaver® II Cutout-Mounted Recloser and VacuFuse® II Self-Resetting Interrupter keep temporary faults from becoming permanent outages—a common occurrence because laterals are the most exposed parts of the grid. Often, faults occur repeatedly in the same location, creating persistent troublesome spots at the edge of the grid. These households are customers experiencing multiple interruptions —or CEMI —a metric designed to measure the individual customer experience. By reducing nuisance outages, customer satisfaction improves and there is no need for an expensive truck roll. That means no more multi-hour trips for line crews to replace a basic fuse —allowing them to focus on more important tasks. 

The TripSaver® II Cutout-Mounted Recloser helps avoid unnecessary truck rolls by preventing 80% of overhead distribution faults from becoming sustained outages. This drastically reduces O&M costs, improves your SAIDI and SAIFI scores, and allows line crews to devote their time to grid modernization projects.

The VacuFuse® II Self-Resetting Interrupter brings fault-testing technology to the edge of the grid, protecting your most vulnerable customers. These troublesome areas are often at the furthest edge of your system and are customers experiencing multiple interruptions (CEMI). By eliminating nuisance faults from overhead distribution transformer fuses, you improve customer satisfaction and save on O&M expenses.

The EdgeRestore® Underground Distribution Restoration System is an automated solution that boosts customer reliability, enhances crew safety, and seamlessly fits into existing residential transformers. When faults or a single loss of source occur on an underground residential lateral circuit, the EdgeRestore system automatically locates the fault, isolates it, and reroutes power from an alternate source—in less than 60 seconds and without a crew.