SaskPower is making infrastructure upgrades in the near future in several communities across the province.

Crews will be in Regina, Moose Jaw, Saskatoon, Prince Albert, White City and Emerald Park to replace 17 kilometers of underground cable and install 80 kilometers of duct work in an effort to reduce outages.

Spokesperson Joel Cherry said the old infrastructure has a limited lifespan.

“At this point we’re getting to a place where a lot of our infrastructure, both above ground and underground, is reaching the end of its useful life,” Cherry said. “We’re getting out there to replace that before it can cause outages.”

Cherry said the ducting will also be used by SaskTel for when they install fiber technology.

“Quite often with utilities when we have utility corridors we’ll make use of the same infrastructure,” Cherry said. “The ducting is going to be useful there as well, and then we don;t have to double-up our efforts; it reduces redundancy and reduces cost for that reason.”

Cherry said about a third of unplanned outages are caused by aging infrastructure.

“Getting out there and making an investment like this to replace that aging infrastructure is going to help us to nip some of those outages in the butt and make sure that we have a reliable source of power for all of our customers.”

The project is part of the crown’s seven year infrastructure program. This year’s work is anticipated to cost $15 million.