‘Whenever a customer in the North West flicks a switch, they can take for granted that the lights will come on’.129
The role of maintenance is shifting. After 2015, the use of social media makes maintenance an integral part of binding customers and providers closer together in the uncertainty of more risk and breakdown prone electricity systems. After the event, responsibility sets in; actions are taken to prevent the disruption from reoccurring again and an emphasis on making the everyday work invisible again - a return to a ‘normal’ functioning system occurs once more.
Energy companies are required to comply with ‘Grid Code’- how they are connected to the grid and able to be held accountable for their actions. This occurs through government regulation that creates a code of conduct for all private markets connected to the National Grid. The system appears to revert back after disruption, which is interesting because it is unclear how desired low energy practices are in reality and highlights how high energy is dormant in forced low energy lives. Communications were central to creating and mobilising publics during the events, after they also created a way for communications between provider and consumer to increase. The opening line of Electricity North West’s Poyry Report, a report that enforced the need for ‘low carbon solutions’ that was commissioned to address the problems facing electricity demand in the near future (stated as the year 2035) parallels with the opening lines of the The Public Services: Electricity (1966). The action of ‘flicking a switch’
still demonstrates the instant and controllable nature of electricity that is perceived as de rigeur today. Published in 2014, before Storm Desmond and yet still in a period when the threat of a blackout was still viable, the report emphasises the idea that ‘taking the lights for granted’ is connected with the visibility of the infrastructure. Chapter 5 demonstrated that during Storm Desmond this presupposed idea of what electricity could do was dismantled through the disruption of mobile communications, transport infrastructures and institutional structures.
129 http://www.enwl.co.uk/about-us/the-future/useful-sitelinks/the-poyry-report
173 However, since the blackout, Electricity NorthWest have presented maintenance as a way of connecting their influence on the grid through the medium of social media, conveying their belief that the company is vital to ‘keeping the lights on’.130 Every time a power cut occurs, a tweet is sent from the distributor’s head office in Manchester, informing those who are following the account that the company is aware of disruption to the network. The exact number of customers affected and the location are sent. The specific information is being presented as not only a form of expertise but as a knowable fact. Highlighting the uncertainty of disruptions; the system becomes visible through the use of tweets, changing the relationship between those who are responsible for the system and those who use it. Those who followed Electricity NorthWest’s social media accounts during the disruption and kept the connection after are aware of the maintenance that is occurring.
Figure 23 : weets sent from @ElectrictyNW, August 3 2017
Through this acknowledgment and explanation of repair work that is going on constantly by engineers and ‘#linesman’, the workers (illustrated through the use of an emoji of a male construction worker wearing a hard hat ) become a tool to highlight the work of company on social media. Although this can be viewed as an appreciation for the work that is ongoing, Thrift refers to this as part of an ‘under-observed infrastructure of kindness’ (2005: 145). The
130 ENW TWITTER
174 need to highlight the preventions that are taking place demonstrates how the visibility of maintenance is viewed as an innovative act that connects the network with the public.
Questions such as ‘have you spotted?’ suggest that these acts are not usual, that they are something to be noticed, and celebrated. It could be said that the companies are trying to sell the labour of maintenance, again emphasises the idea that change is occurring. This exercise in PR produces several tweets a day, for example on the 3rd August 2017 (Figure 23) 26 tweets were posted on the @ElectricityNW account, referencing acts of maintenance that were occurring to prevent power cuts. Despite power cuts being associated with winter - due to both common cause (poor weather) and effect (no heating) – the maintenance work occurring in summer allows the company to remain at the forefront in people’s minds. The use of location hashtags creates another level of visibility, as those who do not follow the account but are searching for tweets based on location will see the posts. Maintenance may be going on around us all the time and may appear ‘inconsequential- and on the other hand essential’ (Hall and Smith, 2015: 6). By presenting upkeep of the electricity network as a benign act that is part of the everyday, Electricity Northwest can be viewed as asserting their power when things go wrong, as they are responsible for electricity grid transmission in the North West England. Elaborate, make concrete what I mean? One could also say that they anticipate accountabilities and deflect them.
The notion that power grid and the company that run the distribution are ‘largely responsible for the feeling that things work, and will go on working, without the need for thought or action on the part of users beyond paying the monthly bills’ (Edwards, 2003) is emphasised through the use of PR to connect with customers. The company presents the idea that there is no need for the public to change any aspect of their day-to-day to day life, as it is all under control.
These acts of maintenance are presented as a ‘hundred little daily experiments in making a better world’ (Plummer, 2013: 514).
During the storm, the ‘slow decay’ that is central to ideas of maintenance was used as a key tool for demonstrating power and knowledge of the system. Electricity NorthWest and engineers placed the slow decay of the historical infrastructure - the placement of the substation - as a key explanation for why the event occurred (Kemp, 2016). The worsening
175 weather and rising sea levels do not bode well for a substation built alongside a river. Here the shift was not solely the physical system breaking down, but additionally the way in which expertise was carried out. Activities to maintain the future do not taking place solely when the system fails, rather the blackout created a moment from which to engage with activities to prevent further blackouts. By using the platform to engage with the increased connections on social media, Electricity NorthWest are not only attempting to emphasise their governance of power networks, but additionally the need to demonstrate that change is occurring. This
‘maintenance in action’ shows the need to make visible the ‘experts’ in routine acts that provide a wider context to workings of the network.
Figure 24: A powercut checklist, ENW
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Figure 25: What to do during a power cut, ENW
In addition to the increased use of social media, since the blackouts during Storm Desmond, Electricity North West has created infographics about how to prepare for a power cut, as well as what to do during a blackout. Figure 24 presents a checklist of how to prepare. The list is full of juxtapositions which highlight the vulnerability of certain technologies during disruption. For example, the checklist suggests having the contact details of the company stored in a mobile phone, yet the next point states the need for a landline telephone. The use of landline telephones was highlighted by participant interviews, for example Susan, who has now bought telephones for all of her key staff. In Lancaster, student estate agents have also provided tenants with an ‘emergencies kit’, consisting of a torch, radio and candles.131 Despite the list highlighting how digital forms of communication ‘follow us on Twitter and Facebook so that you can keep track of updates during a power cut’ are key to being able to prepare for a power cut – the act of preparing does not involve a consideration of how these acts will be sustained during an outage. Additionally, information through these platforms is often delayed and inaccurate when used in the moment. Edgerton views maintenance as a mixture of ‘old’ and ‘new’ technologies (2011). In order to be more prepared for a power cut, the
131 Personal correspondence.
177 merging of perceived technologies occurs. A number saved in a digital mobile phone, but an analogue phone is required if there is a need to notify others about the blackout.
The need to rely on external sources of energy ‘battery powered or wind-up’ to power items normally connected to mains supply, as well as the need to keep ‘paraffin heaters or gas lamps’ serviced regularly, shows the need for practices of repair to be built into the everyday.
Another point which highlights the importance of memory and past events on forming the future is that the need for a radio during a power cut, viewed as being useful in order to listen to weather updates. Severe weather may have been the cause of the 2015 blackout in Lancaster; however, the checklist makes no reference to other forms and reasons for power cuts that may occur.
Figure 25 again places Electricity NorthWest as central to understanding what is happening during power disruption. Repeating the points established in the preparation checklist, the image contains a section on ‘Keeping updated’. Through repetition of the points made, the infographics demonstrate that the act of preparing for disruption is vital to being able to be resilient. It highlights how understanding of the system beforehand is viewed as being the key way to ‘stay safe’ and withstand disruption. If the suggestions presented on the infographics are taken as preparations for a ‘near future’, they demonstrate the need to make future scenarios recognisable and plausible. Through presenting a possible power cut in a similar narrative of what has been experienced by those in the North West of England previously, such as poor weather and the breakdown of digital communication networks, these tips for greater resilience do not engage with the ideas of change that perceive the future to be different and unknown. The time placed on the length of a potential power cut is not noted, but by giving information about the amount of time food can be kept in a fridge without power infers that the company believes that at a power cut is unlikely to extend beyond that time. As Storm Desmond showed, this is not always the case.
In this instance, future power cuts are anticipated as an event that will be similar, or less disruptive, compared to a previous event, but requiring similar practices to those already in place. This may be a successful model for one type of blackout in the near future, but it does
178 not account for multiple futures. In only looking for short term solutions, communicating maintenance can be viewed as an act which needs to be constantly adapted during times of perceived calm. Only future disruptions can highlight what is needed or missing from current modes of resilience. In communicating maintenance of the current system in place, it should be noted how immediately after the three-day week in 1974, maintenance was viewed as a private act within the home – individuals making changes. In the case of Storm Desmond, private companies became public with their repairs and amendments of the systems which they manage.
The checklists are only available online; there are no physical copies of the documents available to the public, unless they wish to make a copy themselves. Although many participants who were interviewed stated that they were more prepared for a blackout to happen in the future, ‘I know what will happen now and what to do’, they believed the blackout would only happen again in a similar circumstance yet a future is being imagined where in the event of a blackout there will be access to digital networks that were not present during Storm Desmond. The set of interactions between past and present demonstrates again how these acts of maintenance contribute to an everyday resilience, but this is still an idealised and dysfunctional form of sustaining through disruption.
Through communicating acts of maintenance and preparation, narratives of the future are created in varying spaces to demonstrate the importance of what has come before. They are also used as a stressor for keeping institutional structures in place. Electricity Northwest is able to present a scenario of a blackout which benefits them – one which places the emphasis on the actions needed to prepare, experience and survive a power cut remaining the same as they were previously. They also involve the added dimension of constant connection to the company if an individual needs help. Those who repair and restore are the maintainers who keep systems running when there is no disaster and they only become visible after the point of breakdown. Their acts of maintenance are now used as a PR tool to emphasise the need to connect with private companies. However, as the next section addresses, after both case studies a new act of maintenance was created through emergency plans.
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