Overhead electric transmission equipment can be intentionally de-energized to mitigate the risk of an unintentional ignition during high fire threat days. Known as Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS), this provides a critical tool for wildfire risk mitigation. A critical gap exists, however: turning off the power does not always eliminate the risk of ignition. De-energized conductors subject to electric and magnetic field induction from nearby energized lines may be sufficiently energized to pose an ignition risk if they fail. A problem that was originally observed back in 2020 for the PSPS use case, it can also extend to seasonally de-energized transmission lines. This presentation addresses the scientific and engineering advances that were made to deploy a viable solution into PG&E’s enterprise data system. The project encompassed: the development of a full-scale induction model using three-dimensional line geometry data with a digital elevation map; the derivation and validation of an ignition model for de-energized and energized states of the transmission system; expansion of failure risk models to enable predictive capabilities; the deployment of these models within a robust data and software platform; construction of intuitive visualization dashboards to communicate complex results; and seamless integration into an existing operational decision-making apparatus. This presentation will explore the context of the problem, the technical and organizational approach used to scope the solution, and the lessons learned so that other utilities can implement these capabilities within their environments.

Session Take-aways:

• Mitigations can have unexpected consequences, and this work emphasizes how to recognize these unexpected outcomes so that they can be navigated accordingly.
• The solution presented in this discussion funnels multiple areas of expertise into a delivered product that drives high consequence decision-making.
• The framework described in this presentation can be adapted to work at other utilities.