Electrical services in Neosho are expanding as crews work to upgrade lines in Neosho.
This month, crews have started replacing poles in the downtown area as part of a move to upgrade lines served by the substation that feeds the northeast part of town.
“We are increasing the system from four kilovolts to 12 kilovolts and in doing that, we had to make some changes to our equipment,” said Amy Bass, director of corporate communications at Empire District Electric Company, “Insulators in particular have to be increased in size.
“By completing this work, we will increase our capability to better serve growth in the Neosho area.”
The number of crews working on the project will vary, but the company has pulled crews from other areas to assist Neosho crews. The company is targeting completion in six to nine months.
Crews will also work on switching, installing additional capability to isolate a problem area during an outage.
“If a car runs into a pole they might be able to isolate that section of line and keep the power on to others,” Bass said.
Empire also has ongoing projects in the area to trim excess vegetation from power lines.
