During National Engineers Week, we are thrilled to celebrate the invaluable contributions of our talented engineers at SWEPCO. This special occasion gives us the opportunity to showcase the pioneering work they do and recognize their impressive achievements.

Through a series of profiles this week, we aim to shed light on their expertise, innovation, and dedication to their craft. These extraordinary individuals consistently demonstrate their problem-solving skills, technical proficiency, and passion for making a positive impact on society through their engineering solutions. National Engineers Week serves as a reminder of the vast capabilities and knowledge possessed by our team, and we are proud to have them driving our company's success.

Brendan Warner 
Transmission Field Services and Power and Control Field Engineer, Shreveport 
Louisiana State University 

Q. What sparked your interest in engineering?
I have always been fascinated with the "how" and "why" of things.  When I was younger, I loved to watch How It’s Made, MythBusters, and Modern Marvels. I think those shows provided that initial spark. It’s amazing to me to see what humans are capable of.

Q. What’s your latest project for SWEPCO?
 Recently, I have been working with other Transmission Field Service personnel to rehab the 138kV portion of Longwood substation. The project involves replacing older substation equipment with more reliable and modern equipment. This rehab project will allow AEP to provide more reliable power and strengthen the transmission grid in Shreveport and the surrounding areas.

Q. What do you enjoy about being an engineer? 
Engineering allows me to help create new and innovative approaches to problem-solving. I like to be challenged to find workable solutions and put those into action. The field of engineering touches people in all aspects of their day, and I enjoy being a part of improving their quality of life.

Q. What sparked your interest in engineering?
When I was a kid, I was always taking things apart and trying to repurpose them to do other cool things instead of whatever they were meant to do. And as a kid whatever it was meant to do was probably boring anyways, so I was just making it better in my little kid brain. That naturally developed into more tinkering and then into trying to learn why these things did what they did, all the way to a full-blown engineering career.

Q. What’s your latest project for SWEPCO?
I actually just started last week, and so my first “project,” if you could call it that, has been learning the plant here at Welsh, so that when I am working on designs, I actually know what I am designing for and around.

Q. What do you enjoy about being an engineer?
I think it still comes down to that desire to tinker and figure things out from when I was a kid. I just kept doing that, and now, if I don’t understand why something is the way it is, I can go figure it out.

Q. What do you do for fun?
I have been dancing both competitively and casually for fun for almost a decade now. And so, if I am not working, gaming, or spending time with friends, I am most likely spinning people around and throwing them in the air!

Collin Gordon
Engineering Technologist, Transmission in Northwest Arkansas
Louisiana Tech University
Joined SWEPCO in 2021
 
Q. What sparked your interest in engineering?

I was interested in building and racing cars in my high school and college years, and wanted to learn more about the how and the why of what makes a vehicle work. I eventually became more interested in the electricity side of the how and why, and shifted into that field which led me to study electrical engineering technology.

Q. What’s your latest project for SWEPCO?

My latest jobs have been upgrading older D20 Remote Terminal Units (RTU) with SMP 4260s. These devices collect the data from some station equipment and then send it to dispatch. In addition, they allow dispatch to control the equipment remotely.

Q. What do you enjoy about being an engineer?

I enjoy that I get to work on something different every day and encounter problems that require me to learn continuously throughout my career.

Q. What do you do for fun?

In my spare time in enjoy taking the family out to the national forest, mountain biking, and playing disc golf.

Jana Asuncion 
Distribution Planning Engineer, Shreveport  
Louisiana Tech University
Joined SWEPCO in 2022

Q. What sparked your interest in engineering?

Learning about the world’s energy crisis and how it affects the environment made me want to pursue engineering. I wanted to either work in Generation or Distribution, and I was lucky to land in Distribution.

Q. What’s your latest project for SWEPCO?

There are several new customer projects that emerged in the Valley District. The newest project I’m working on is a project to upgrade the Hicks Station, which is an older substation where we need to increase capacity to handle a larger customer load. I'm also working on a new point-of-delivery near the Gahagan Station, which will allow SWEPCO distribution to serve our customers in the area through Cleco transmission. 

Q. What do you enjoy about being an engineer?

Considering how the extreme weather conditions facing Louisiana in the past couple years has presented our grid with some new challenges, I find a lot of satisfaction in coming up with solutions and push projects for it with the help of other engineers in my area. It’s a little daunting to see the pain points throughout our system, but it feels good knowing we’re addressing them and will see improvements soon.

Q. What do you do for fun?

I usually spend my time after work playing video games with my fiancé. On Thursdays, I enter video game tournaments with him and our friends. When the weather is nice, we like to go for walks around the different parks in Shreveport and Bossier City.