Wheatbelt blackouts: Outages strike as Cook Government talks up reliability track record

Opposition Leader Shane Love has slammed WA’s Energy Minister for talking up the Cook Government’s power reliability track record on the same day a major blackout hit the Wheatbelt and Mid West. More than 1500 households faced unplanned power outages on October 30, with Mid West communities the worst affected. The same day the Government announced a fleet of 24 drones would be deployed over summer to monitor WA’s expansive network of poles and wires — a move Western Power hoped would lead to fewer and shorter blackouts. WA Energy Minister Reece Whitby said the drones complemented the State Government’s annual investment of $1 billion in the Western Power network. “Our network is large and complicated, and these investments will ensure we can make it as reliable as possible,” he said. Mr Whitby said Labor’s “ongoing commitment to keeping Western Power in public hands” meant WA taxpayers owned the utility’s network of about 860,000 poles. But Mr Love said the Government’s track record with regional power reliability was abysmal. “While the energy minister boasts about power reliability, 1289 households in the Wheatbelt had their lights go out, leaving them sweltering on a hot day and disrupting local businesses,” he said. “Meanwhile, another 220 households in the Mid West endured outages, with some waiting over 10 hours for power to return.” Mr Love said regional WA was unprepared for the summer, labelling the drone announcement a “band-aid” solution. “While drones and aerial inspections might sound impressive, these short-term tactics fail to address systemic issues in Western Power’s network — issues that impact regional and metropolitan areas alike,” he said. “Real investment in infrastructure hardening, network resilience and backup generation is long overdue.” According to Mr Love, seven of the top 10 most impacted local government areas for power outages are in the Mid West, including Chapman Valley, Dandaragan, Morawa, Dalwallinu, Irwin, Mingenew and Three Springs. He said they experienced a combined total of 150 hours without power in 2022-23. Shire of Dalwallinu president Keith Carter told Countryman the community experienced power outages for more than 12 hours on Wednesday. He said Western Power repeatedly pushed back the estimated time the power would be back up. “The messages were that it was going to come on at 7.30am, then it was going to come on at nine, then 12, and then three. And then it didn’t come on at all that day,” Mr Carter said. He said most local businesses had installed backup power generators to ensure they did not lose too much stock. However, Mr Carter added there had been improvements in power outages over the winter period, and he was hopeful the issue would continue getting better. “I know they’ve (Western Power) been doing a lot of pole work trying to make it much more reliable . . . After that big storm in late January they decided to invest a lot more money into new poles and hopefully we’ll see the benefit of that going forward,” he said. “The days seem to stay so hot late into the day (during summer) . . . You pretty much need air-conditioning to get a good night’s sleep.” The announcement comes after storms and bushfires in January plunged tens of thousands of houses in Perth and regional WA into darkness.