10 Mar Use Case: Fire Mitigation
The latest urgent issue for electric utilities is fire prevention. Powerline-caused wildfires put a utility and their customers at a tremendous risk both financially and more importantly threaten their safety and security.
The fact that a single wildfire like the Camp Fire can cause so much damage, loss of life, and force a 100+ year old utility into bankruptcy, has opened the eyes of utility executives and regulators around the world. As a result, most utilities now include wildfire prevention as part of their risk mitigation plans. The typical fire prevention plan focuses on vegetation management, fire retardants, and overhead line hardening, but utility-controlled communications networks and the Internet of Things (IoT) can enable new services and advanced technologies to complement traditional fire prevention strategies…
