2 minute read
Technological Use to Aid in a Long-Standing Problem
Technological Use to Aid
in a Long-Standing Problem
- By Daniel Gent -
Director, Risk, Reliability and Resiliency, Canadian Electricity Association
For over three years, trees have accounted for roughly one in five outages in Canada. For over five years, they have been among the top reasons Canadians encounter power outages.
Reducing tree-related outages is a recurring topic amongst reliability experts. Given that trees are self-renewing, they are continually growing and can cause both minor and major outages by damaging distribution and transmission lines. In 2019 alone, trees accounted for over 48 million hours of customer interruptions. However, despite all the distress they may inflict on our economy’s great enabler, trees are inherently good. They offer shade, building material, and are, after-all, the greatest carbon filter on the planet, so it's wise to keep them around. The federal government’s plan to plant billions of trees is an interesting endeavour to combat climate change – let’s just remember to keep them away from powerlines and structures. It will be necessary and mutually beneficial for government to coordinate such endeavours with the electricity industry.
Vegetation management stands at the crux of a transformative movement. With an increasing focus on environmental stewardship, wildfire ignition mitigation and improving reliability, technology will allow utilities to make better decisions on these practices.
Utilities have renewed the fight against tree-induced outages with the application of modern technology and information systems. Long gone are the days of walking the right-of-way and performing visual inspection to identify a hazard tree. Satellite, Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are all being used in the war against tree induced outages.
This technology combined with tracking and recording precipitation, soil texture, acid levels and moisture, tree types in data applications help analyze the broader picture and predict the growth rate of tree species along rightsof-way. Analytics are being used in ways to help utilities manage their vast jurisdictions and budgets to better serve the customers.
These are all innovative endeavours that will help draft strategic vegetation management plans that are key in enabling improved reliability.
By embracing cutting-edge technological solutions, utilities have an opportunity to improve grid performance, all while showcasing innovation and highlighting customer service. These strategies can be summarized in one sentence by a great military strategist, Sun Tzu.
LiDAR calculates the distance of an object with the use of light waves bouncing back to the initiating sensor. LiDAR is often used to create 3-D laser scans for highresolution maps.
