Moore MP Shane Love MLA has welcomed news that Western Power will provide Mullewa with a solution to the town’s power issues.
Western Power said the high voltage generator to be installed in Mullewa would provide power to the town if there was an outage lasting more than 30 minutes.
Mr Love said the news was a relief given the run of power outages in Mullewa in the last week and the town’s longstanding poor reliability when it came to electricity supply.
“I have made numerous representations to a number of Energy Ministers over the years and am glad to hear that Western Power are working with the City of Greater Geraldton to find a long term solution,” Mr Love said.
“Today in Parliament I asked Energy Minister, Bill Johnston to act to ensure that the Mullewa community has a power supply that meets even the lowest of community expectations.
“Minister Johnston conceded that Mullewa’s power supply was below the required benchmarks, adding that work was underway to address power supply issues in Kalbarri and Perenjori, and Mullewa would be next.”
Western Power advice relating to power outages in the preceding 14 months indicates the average disruption index for outages in Mullewa was 3,957 minutes, against a service standard benchmark of 848 minutes and a Western Power target of 677 minutes. The standard benchmark for frequency of outages was 5.7 events since January 2018 compared to an actual figure in Mullewa of 10.37 events and a Western Power target of 4.29.
Mr Love said these recent figures confirmed Mullewa’s power reliability had deteriorated in the past two years based on data released by Western Power at a public meeting in February 2017.
“I wrote to the current Energy Minister about the unreliable power supply in Mullewa and the Mid West months ago,” Mr Love added. “The most lengthy outages often occur when there is a Total Fire Ban in place and I have asked that the Minister for Energy and Minister for Emergency Services review their procedures to enable the timely restoration of power.”
