Member Profiles: Florence Utility Commission

In the northeastern section of sparsely populated Florence County, Wisconsin is the township of Florence. It is the county seat of Florence County, a large area bordered by the Nicolet National Forest with no incorporated cities or villages in the area.

Florence Natural Gas foreman Garret Trudell at the gate station checking the heater for the upcoming season.

Serving natural gas, electricity, water and wastewater to approximately 2600 souls here is the Florence Utility Commission. The utility has some history. The water system was built in 1889, followed by the electric system in 1890.The natural gas operation started from the ground up exactly 100 years later. Florence originally had asked the surrounding investor-owned gas utilities to provide them service. When those utilities declined, the township decided to do it themselves They hired RW Beck to do a feasibility study, and it was shown that building their own gas system was a better option than oil, fuel oil, or propane. They connected their system with ANR pipeline seven miles from Florence and built the system in from there. They presently purchase their gas supply through their membership in the National Public Gas Agency (NPGA), located in Lincoln, Nebraska.

After the township constructed the gas system themselves, there was some interest from other communities in the state to also build their own systems. However, the same companies that refused to install gas in Florence earlier were now much more flexible and installed gas in many small communities throughout the state, possibly to head off other municipal gas systems from forming.

Since the system is so recent, it was built entirely with plastic pipe. Their system consists of 66 miles of main covering 44 square miles with approximately 1200 meters. The combined utility has ten full-time and two part-time employees. Of these, two are dedicated to gas, while six others are cross-trained to operate in the gas system as needed.

Because they are the first - and so far, only - municipal gas operation in Wisconsin, they have had to create operations manuals, and learn about interactions with state, federal pipeline authorities from scratch. The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin was not enthusiastic about the Florence gas system back at the beginning, but they now have a good working relationship.

After initial installation, Florence has been doing most of the expansion work with its own crews. In addition, the Florence system is now going to automated meter reading, to ease the job of reading meters in some of the more remote areas in the county.

A river inside Nicolet National Forest.

Their customer base is currently residential/ light commercial and recreational use. However, they are looking at going into new residential areas and some industrial too. “The support of the people we serve has been tremendous, even with the recent high gas prices.” Commented Florence’s General Manager, Bob Friberg.

The system joined APGA in 1992 initially for the Insurance Group. Since then, they have become more acquainted with the organization, and appreciate the activities it does on a national level that small systems like Florence can not do for themselves.

The state and federal bureaucracy has been onerous for a small utility. If APGA can guide them to streamlining and avoiding the duplications and cutting back on paperwork, it would be tremendous.

Originally in October 21, 2006 Public Gas News