UniSource Energy Services is preparing several system improvement projects through the end of the year to strengthen service reliability and serve customers’ future energy needs.

Crews began work in September on a long-term effort to upgrade and modernize electric distribution equipment in historic downtown Kingman. About a dozen new power poles and
higher-capacity wire will be installed in an area near the City of Kingman’s municipal complex on North 4th Street during the project’s first phase. The first phase of the project,
totaling approximately $350,000 in improvements, is expected to be completed by the end of November. Additional improvements in downtown Kingman are scheduled for 2016.

Site preparation has begun for a $2.7 million upgrade of UES’ South Kingman substation, located east of Interstate 40 near Historic Route 66. Installation of a new, larger transformer
and other improvements at the site will continue through mid-2016. Work is expected to begin this fall on the first phase of a related, multi-year upgrade to the distribution feeder
lines leading out of the substation. This year, crews will make more than $500,000 in upgrades to a mile-long stretch of lines by installing new, higher-capacity wires and about 20
new power poles. Additional line improvements are planned over the next three years.

In October, work is expected to begin on another multi-year effort to upgrade a 15-mile stretch of transmission and distribution lines that run from the Western Wind Energy facility
south of Kingman to UES’ Boriana Substation, located southwest of Kingman in Golden Valley. New steel poles and higher-capacity conductors will be installed along the route. During
the first phase, which is scheduled to be completed in December, about 80 poles will be installed over five miles, representing more than $1 million in improvements.

System upgrades completed this year in Mohave County include:

• A $2.2 million upgrade of the West Golden Valley Substation, located west of Kingman. A new transformer and other upgrades doubled the substation’s capacity. The project was
  completed in July.
• More than $300,000 in improvements to a 5-mile stretch of a distribution line linking the Yucca Substation near Kingman and the Franconia substation near Lake Havasu City.
  Additional improvements are planned in 2016 and 2017. The upgrades provide greater service reliability for industrial customers and others situated between the two cities.
• Additional reinforcements for a transmission line south of Lake Havasu City that was damaged by summer storms in 2014.