Automating utility pole inspection in Orangeburg, South Carolina

Automating utility pole inspection in Orangeburg, South Carolina

by John Johnson, reprinted from Intelligent Utility

THE ORANGEBURG, S.C., DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES used to have one of the simplest utility pole inspection programs in the industry.

"Our policy was basically that when the pole falls down, we put one back up," acknowledged John Bagwell, director of the Electric Division at Orangeburg DPU, located about 40 miles southeast of Columbia, S.C. "We never really used to inspect poles."

That was before the utility discovered the benefits of radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. The Orangeburg DPU, the largest municipal electric utility in South Carolina, began affixing RFID tags to its wooden utility poles last year. The utility has tagged 4,000 poles to date, and hopes to tag an additional 5,000 poles this summer.

Bagwell said that the utility turned to RFID to help it "to monitor, service and maintain its entire pole distribution network." He hopes to tag all 33,000 poles owned by the utility within two to three years.

Read the full article at Intelligent Utility