Fire gate

Ann Zaniewski Detroit Free Press Published 6:45 PM EDT Apr 5, 2019 A fire at a compression station in Macomb County was sparked, in part, by a glitch in a system that is designed to release natural gas in case of an emergency, Consumers Energy officials said Friday.   Wind and cold weather were also factors in the Jan. 30 fire at the utility's Ray Compressor Station in northern Macomb County. More: Roberta Hughes Wright, attorney, educator and widow of Charles H. Wright, dies More: Man, 30, in critical after shooting on Woodward in Midtown The incident prompted officials to ask people to turn down their thermostats amid concerns about keeping natural gas flowing to millions of residents in bitterly cold weather.  Consumers Energy said its two-month internal review of the fire "found no evidence of failure to properly maintain our equipment."   "The fire and damage at the Ray Station was precipitated by a safety venting … [Read more...] about High winds factor in gas compression station fire

Beth LeBlanc The Detroit News Published 4:09 PM EDT Apr 5, 2019 Consumers Energy's two-month review of a Jan. 30 compressor station fire on the coldest days of the year found that the fire was not a result of improper equipment maintenance. The company said it will review a safety venting system that its officials believe led to a fireball erupting above its Macomb County compressor stations, knocking out the company’s major storage supply site. The fire at the Ray Compressor Station led the state to beg residents to turn down their thermostats as temperatures dipped into negative digits in late January. The complicated series of events that led to the fire “was a perfect storm of things that never happened before that all happened at the same time,” said Consumers Energy spokeswoman Katie Carey. A ground fault that interrupted the signal to the plant’s fire gate control system caused a station to release gas, Carey said. But because of the … [Read more...] about Consumers Energy: Equipment maintenance was not issue in Jan. 30 fire

Kathleen Gray Detroit Free Press Published 4:49 PM EST Feb 20, 2019 LANSING — A disastrous confluence of natural and man-made events led to a dire emergency for Consumers Energy and its 1.8 million customers on Michigan on Jan. 30. In a minute-by-minute explanation of the circumstances leading up to an emergency alert text message sent to Michiganders at 10:30 p.m., urging them to turn down their thermostats on what was then the coldest night of the year, Consumers CEO Patti Poppe told members of the Michigan House Energy committee Wednesday that all the planning done by the utility over the years to ensure the heat stayed on was nearly for naught. “I stood in the control room with 20-30 veterans of the company and their faces were ashen,” Poppe said. “They have never seen anything like this before.” “This” was a series of events that started with a fire at the Ray Compressor station in Macomb County at 10:33 a.m. on Jan. 30. … [Read more...] about Consumers Energy gives details of polar vortex fire emergency