2021/10/14 by Sofia Taylor, Taylor, Sofia, Line Roald +1 · 4 citations
Engineering · Environmental Science · #FOS: Electrical engineering #Fire Detection and Safety Systems #Fire effects on ecosystems #Landslides and related hazards #Systems and Control (eess.SY) #electronic engineering #information engineering
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2110.07348
openalex publication_date 2021/10/14 · openalex created_date 2022/07/25 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
As wildfires in the United States are becoming more frequent and severe, mitigating wildfire ignition risk from power line faults is an increasingly crucial effort. Long-term ignition prevention strategies, especially converting overhead lines to underground cables, are expensive. Thus, it is important to prioritize upgrades on lines that will reduce wildfire ignition risk the most. However, since so many factors contribute to ignition risk, it is difficult to quantify the wildfire risk associated with power lines. This paper examines how various risk definitions based on historical wildfire risk maps can be used to inform transmission upgrade planning. These risk metrics are evaluated using an optimization model that determines which overhead lines should be undergrounded such that the total wildfire risk in the network is minimized. The risk assignment and upgrade selection are tested on both a synthetic network and the actual transmission lines in California.