The city of Kinston announced that the second Point of Delivery (POD) construction is moving along.

“Most cities our size have more than one point of delivery,” said Public Services Director Rhonda Barwick. “If that connection to our supplier should fail or is damaged the entire customer base would be without power until it could be re-energized.”

Kinston has one POD providing power from its suppliers to all of its customers. While Kinston has been fortunate in the past, several cities in North Carolina have suffered during major storm events. A second POD will enable Kinston to continue to provide service to its customers while the original POD is repaired.

“We've been planning this for five to six years and we've saved the money,” said City Manager Tony Sears. “Financing would not be needed. No rate increases are associated with this project.”

The project will cost $5.4 million. A second POD enhances Kinston’s transmission loop. This will increase the flexibility of its system during outages caused by more routine issues like traffic accidents or equipment damage.

“Once the second POD is energized if we lose power to our original POD the city could switch our source to the second POD and continue to serve our customers while the repairs are made,” said Barwick.

With a series of switches, the city of Kinston can isolate damaged areas of the distribution system to minimize the number of customers without power while repairs are made.

“While we already have a transmission loop and the ability to perform some switching, this project will increase that flexibility,” said Barwick