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There’s a special group of employees at CPS Energy who you can thank every time you flip a light switch, turn on your TV or cook dinner. Those unsung heroes are our men and women lineworkers and the teams that support them.
Our lineworkers are on the job 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, to keep the power on in every home and business in San Antonio. They work in all kinds of weather conditions, including extreme heat and bitter cold.
Lineworkers safely install, service and emergency repair electrical lines every day, including when lightning, rain, wind and ice storms blow through our community. They are also on the scene to repair if a car hits a pole and causes an outage. On National Lineman Appreciation Day, we extend our thanks to these teams who work to provide power to our community day in and day out.
Our lineworkers are responsible for installing and maintaining more than 8,213 miles of overhead lines, 6,535 miles of underground lines and 1,555 miles of transmission lines — more than 16,000 miles of electric transmission and distribution lines covering CPS Energy’s service area.
Oftentimes, a lineworker will carry 40 pounds of gear, equivalent to a 5-gallon water jug, when climbing poles up to 70 feet tall. They work in any weather condition thrown at them, from scorching hot summer days to sometimes having inches of rain inside the bucket of their bucket truck.
They work hand in hand with other first responders to restore power to homes and businesses in their time of need – this includes safely handling energized lines using special techniques and equipment backed by thorough training and protective equipment.
Our lineworkers aren’t just our own hometown heroes. Just a few months ago, our energy crews traveled to hurricane-battered sections of Florida to help those communities regain the power they needed to begin getting their lives back on track after severe storm damage from Hurricane Ian. When Winter Storm Mara hit the Austin area with ice earlier this year, damaging trees, downing power lines and causing widespread outages, our crews headed north to help the neighboring utility restore service.
Mutual aid is what public power utilities do: we help each other, joining other utilities to bring relief to those affected by natural disasters.
This National Lineman Appreciation Day, we celebrate every one of these heroic men and women who weather any condition to ensure that our customers can flip that light switch and do everyday things that are easy to take for granted.
Being able to provide our community and its neighborhoods with the reliability they need to live their lives is powerful, and we mean it when we say that our people are our energy. Join us in thanking and celebrating the brave lineworkers at CPS Energy and the teams and families who support them. Happy National Lineman Appreciation Day, April 18.
About CPS Energy
Established in 1860, CPS Energy is the nation’s largest community-owned provider of electric and natural gas services. We provide safe, reliable and competitively priced services to 907,526 electric and 373,998 natural gas customers in San Antonio and portions of seven adjoining counties. Our customers’ combined energy bills rank among the lowest of the nation’s 20 largest cities while generating $9 billion in revenue for the City of San Antonio over the last 80 years.
Our Vision 2027 strategic plan is designed to guide CPS Energy through rapid transformational change in our city. As a trusted and reliable community partner, we continuously focus on job creation, economic development, and educational investment. We are powered by our skilled workforce, whose commitment to the community is demonstrated through our employees’ volunteerism, our community engagement efforts and programs aimed at bringing value and assistance to our customers.
