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Rural Montana wins national award

Posted at 5:13 PM, Apr 10, 2019
and last updated 2019-04-10 19:13:22-04

The Montana Electric Cooperatives’ Association’s magazine, Rural Montana, recently won a national award for one of their pieces.

Their story ‘A New Type of Nuclear Power,’ which appeared in their September 2018 issue, won the 2019 Spotlight of Excellence Award.

The award is given annually and is sponsored by the Council of Rural Electric Communicators and the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA).

‘A New Type of Nuclear Power’ was about new nuclear technology being studied in Oregon.

Rural Montana Editor Ryan Hall was given a tour of the facility in Oregon and wrote about it.

He said it’s important to Montana because of carbon-free sources for the future.

He said, “This is a company that made a presentation in Montana. So, we wanted to let our members know what the technology was, what it was and wasn’t capable of, and what could be out there for the future.”

Hall added that a lot of the feedback after the article was written was how well he broke down a complicated subject.

“I think that was the goal of the piece, just to take something that was above all of our heads,” he said. “I sat in those rooms talking to nuclear engineers in terms way above my head and bring it down to a level that most of us could understand it.”

The annual Spotlight on Excellence Awards program recognizes the best communication and marketing efforts by electric cooperatives and related organizations.

Electric cooperative communicators and marketing professionals submitted nearly 640 entries to the program.

A special reception honoring the award recipients will be held during the CONNECT ’19 Conference held in Houston, Texas on May 7.

Rural Montana currently reaches about 125,000 homes. To view the full article, click here.

-Reported by Kasey Herman/MTN News