Western's Watertown Operations Center operates around the clock, 365 days a year. Watertown staff play a direct role in marketing and delivering reliable, cost-based hydroelectric power and related services to customers in seven states. Watertown Operations Center dispatchers determine where to deliver power and how to meet the real-time demands of power system reliability. Supporting the transmission system reliability are maintenance crews, one of which is based in Watertown. The maintenance crews keep the power transmission lines and substation equipment working properly.
Marketing and transmitting power
The Watertown Operations Center is part of Western's Upper Great Plains Region, which is headquartered in Billings, Mont. The Upper Great Plains Region sells and distributes hydropower from the Pick-Sloan Missouri Basin Project—Eastern Division. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers operate seven dams in the region to generate 10 billion kilowatthours of electricity each year. The power marketing staff administers power deliveries and sales to more than 315 customers in a seven-state area, including North and South Dakota, most of Montana, and parts of Nebraska, Iowa, Wyoming and Minnesota. To conserve
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Transfer capacity: 5,000 megawatts
Miles of transmission: 9,000
Number of substations: More than 200 | water, they purchase power to support the contracts when reservoir levels are low, and they sell surplus power when reservoir levels are high.
Operating the system
Dispatchers in Watertown operate the Federal power system and the power systems of other utilities, in a seven-state area. One group of dispatchers controls about 5,000 megawatts of generating capacity. Hydropower plants generate about half of that capacity; the other half is coal-fired steam generation. A second group of dispatchers manages power flow on more than 9,000 miles of high voltage transmission lines.
Of course, all the power has to first be scheduled according to power delivery, purchase and interchange capacity, as well as the amount of energy available.
Power billing
In addition, monthly bills must be prepared and distributed. Power bills are initiated from the Watertown Operations Office and sent monthly to more than 600 customers who buy Federal hydropower or use the Federal transmission system.
Control areas
Watertown Operations staff operate two control areas. The larger of the two is within the Mid-Continent Area Power Pool and the second is within the Western Systems Coordinating Council. Dispatchers supervise and direct power flow through more than 200 substations across the Upper Great Plains Region.
East-West interconnection
Watertown staff also operate the Alternating Current-Direct Current-Alternating Current Converter Station at Miles City, Mont. The Miles City Converter Station interconnects the nation’s eastern and western power grids and is one of the dividing lines between our two control areas.
At the converter station, alternating-current electricity from one grid is converted to direct current. It is then converted back to alternating current at the proper voltage and frequency for transmission across the other side. This facility allows dispatchers to move power between the two electric grids.
Other interconnections
UGP's transmission system interconnects with Southwestern Power Administration's transmission system at Maryville, Mo. On the western side, power exchanges with Bonneville Power Administration are possible through a transmission service agent.
Watertown dispatchers also manage 92 control area interconnections, 83 within the Eastern Interconnection and nine within the Western Interconnection.
System operators also arrange deliveries to 1,040 load serving interconnections for delivery to Western's customers.
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