Why Modernizing Power Grid Inspections is Essential for any Storm Hardening Strategy

The need for power utilities to respond quickly and efficiently to storm-induced power outages was put into sharp relief during the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season – one that has felt different from previous years. We saw a record-breaking number of storms form and intensify over warmer-than-average ocean waters. “One thing this hurricane season is illustrating clearly is that the impacts of climate change are here now,” explains Dr. Andra Garner of Rowan University. 

Beryl, was the earliest Category 5 Atlantic hurricane on record, and only the second recorded in July. Helene caused widespread destruction throughout the southeastern United States before dissipating over central Appalachia – a region not typically accustomed to dealing with hurricanes. Milton became the second-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded over the Gulf of Mexico before making landfall on the west coast of Florida. 

Tackling Immediate Post-Storm Priorities

This intensification hit many communities hard – especially ones where families lack the means to evacuate or access basic necessities. In the critical 48 hours following an initial storm hit, the top priority for utilities is to restore power as efficiently and safely as possible. This requires an assessment of local T&D infrastructure (i.e., downed conductors, tree limbs on power lines, damage to poles and towers) but also accessibility. With Helene, unexpected, record-breaking flooding left utilities with no easy way to dispatch teams to restore power or even assess the extent of the damage in certain neighborhoods. 

Utilities must also triage their response to restoring power. This includes tailoring their strategy to each region and storm’s unique challenges. During Hurricane Ida in 2021, Louisiana utilities prioritized restoring power to critical infrastructure such as hospitals, emergency shelters, and food supply facilities due to the high needs of displaced residents in the extreme heat. In contrast, in the 2021 Texas Winter Storm, the priority was getting gas and electricity back and running as soon as possible with subzero temperatures.

All of this post-storm assessment requires visual inspection of both the grid and larger community to understand what needs to be fixed and what infrastructure is accessible based on flooding and other damage. In many post-storm environments, the legacy method of inspections is unfeasible (driving along the lines, manually inspecting, entering notes into a ticketing system for repair). Many utilities are modernizing inspections with drones, which are playing an increased role in post-storm inspection and response. With the ability to fly UAVs over flooded areas that ground crews can’t access, utilities can assess affected areas and help feed info to response teams for real-time triage and decision making. Recently, the Orlando Utilities Commission announced that they are developing an aerial drone program to assist with power restoration.

In a post-storm environment, time is of the essence, especially as it pertains to restoring power. Identifying where poles and towers need to be maintained must be done quickly and efficiently. Manual inspections and data analysis are too costly for both time and human resources. Therefore, the combination of drones and AI-enabled image analysis is moving from “nice to have” to “must have" for utilities and their storm hardening strategies. Most utilities understand the basic value of the combined solution (drones + AI-enabled analysis) for day-to-day inspections, which is:

• The ability to find more issues and proactively address them (inspection effectiveness).
• Conserve labor resources (inspection efficiency, or service inputs/outputs).

However, modern inspection processes pay off in a third important way after storms – speed.  Utilities can inspect and respond faster. This is a benefit that is often overlooked. Many grid restoration processes begin with the same step of inspections. When you modernize the inspection process, you accelerate numerous restoration processes. 

Beyond Reaction: The role of inspections in storm preparedness

Storm preparedness vs. storm response often require massively different strategies. Utilities that operate in areas with severe storms (or wildfires in different regions) have considered undergrounding as part of their storm hardening. The concept isn’t without merit: 

The rationale is that putting electric lines underground would shield them from high winds, falling tree limbs and other wire-snapping incidents, such as automobile crashes that take out power poles. The idea, commenters asserted, would have avoided the mass outages resulting from Beryl and the derecho in May.

The challenge with undergrounding at scale is one of pure economics. Burying power lines costs up to 5x more than running them overhead, a cost that utilities would ultimately have to pass to their customers. According to PG&E, SCE and SDG&E, the costs for undergrounding existing overhead distribution infrastructure can range anywhere from $350 per foot to $1150 per foot, or $1.85 million to $6.072 million per mile. This is why undergrounding investment is often reserved for only the highest risk segments of the grid.

While post-storm environment inspections are excellent for immediate response, there’s a significant opportunity for utilities to take a broader view of ongoing infrastructure inspections (preventative vs. reactionary) to fill existing gaps. Following some of the recent hurricanes, many east coast utilities have expressed interest in better understanding what specific damage resulted from the storm, or what were pre-existing issues (e.g., missing pole, insulator, conductor, etc.). The challenge for many is a lack of centralized baseline inspection data to be able to reference.  Historically, this data has not been stored in an easily accessible or retrievable manner, which makes it much more challenging to detect changes in the infrastructure condition.

This is where investing in inspection modernization with regular data collection and centralized cataloging of inspection data can help utilities more effectively track the health of their infrastructure (independent from storm resilience), which becomes particularly important in a post-storm environment. With this data, utilities can locate which infrastructure components were damaged as a direct result of the storm vs. a preexisting anomaly. It’s an entirely new layer of preparedness.    

Thinking past the storm: Proactive, multi-use inspections

Because hurricanes and other natural disasters are acute events, it’s easy to think about the importance of inspection data for a one-time critical and immediate need. However, there’s a great opportunity to approach inspection data more broadly across teams and across departments well past any immediate storm. The value of modernizing inspections go far beyond a response measure (though response is important). 

Even if a predicted storm doesn’t hit, or the impact was not as severe as expected, ongoing pre- and post-storm inspections still provide a wealth of data on infrastructure health, which can be used for asset tracking over time, tracking rates of failure, inventorying your most up to date system, and other benefits far beyond immediate storm preparation. 

Unsiloed inspection data (e.g., storm response, vegetation management, etc.) is not only great internally for utilities, it’s a potential boon to the entire industry. Again, as climate changes and different regions are impacted by natural disasters they aren’t accustomed to, a big part of preparedness is having the shared learnings on what has worked and what hasn’t for other utilities facing similar challenges. In the wildfire-prone areas in California, the utilities engage in vegetation management, trimming trees and clearing brush around power lines to mitigate damage. In storm-prone areas, utilities that conduct ongoing inspections could build a resource of valuable data that can support recovery, reduce costs, and guide strategic maintenance. 

Final Thoughts

Utilities have a powerful opportunity to transform not only storm preparedness and response, but their entire operations by taking a proactive approach to preventative maintenance. Investing in grid resilience, including modernizing inspections, is not only cost-effective compared to undergrounding and other strategies, but essential for building a smarter, adaptable grid that supports communities through weather, or other challenges. Proactive inspection practices, supported by innovative hardware and software, enable utilities to reduce costs, increase speed, and safeguard infrastructure in a way that’s adaptable to whatever future storms may be brewing.