Researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Gandhinagar have developed a comprehensive framework that can reduce the damage to power transmission systems in coastal areas under cyclone scenarios. The team used the damage-cum-wind speed data of Cyclone “Fani” in Odisha to develop a delicate model for the towers, which helps in assessing the network functionality and the impact of strategic interventions on the same.
The results of the study showed that a higher number of reinforced towers or a greater level of reinforcing in a particular area, based on tailor-made and efficient reinforcement prioritization strategies, leads to better performance of power transmission systems.
According to the team, they found that the most efficient strategy may be to take a fraction of the towers from areas with the highest wind speeds (by Indian standards) that are connected to substations serving a large population.
The framework could be useful for cost-effective strengthening of transmission tower networks in other coastal states of India such as Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra,” said Associate Professor at IIT Gandhinagar.
This is the first research work of its kind because here we were able to appropriately consider a large-scale network, its relationship to the coastline, a suitable context-specific fragility curve for towers, and realistic cyclone scenarios, with Due for interesting insights into strengthening strategies for Odisha’s electricity transmission network.
This observation emphasizes the need to consider the orientation of the network in relation to the realistic properties of the coastline and cyclones. The researchers also noted that the loss of functionality in power transmission can be significantly affected by the path of a cyclone before it makes landfall.
The researchers found that the reduction in the efficiency of transmission towers depends largely on the location of the cyclone’s landfall. The damage was greater if the landfall was close to an area with many substations in the vicinity.
The research team also found that reinforcing towers in a transmission line connected to a significant substation close to the beach (importance was quantified in terms of the population served by the substation) resulted in the maximum increase in performance, meaning That lesser population is affected, he claimed.
Strengthening towers close to the coast may help reduce the number of towers damaged during the cyclone to some extent, but its resulting impact on the affected population may not be as significant.
A simulated cyclone trajectory indicated that it could cause damage to the towers as well as 300 km:
The framework developed by the team helps in prioritizing the towers that need to be strengthened to reduce the overall loss in functionality in a cost-effective manner.
A simulated cyclone trajectory indicated that it could also damage towers up to 300 km from each other, underscoring the need to further conduct such studies on an overall scale.
The team considered two broad aspects to identify towers for priority reinforcement which were the identification of a geographic area and the basis of priority within that geographic area.
Decision-makers always face a hurdle at 3Ms:
In post-disaster scenarios, decision makers always face a constraint on 3Ms, i.e., Manpower, Money (budget), and Materials. Hence, bird with component level view to identify the right- The vision needs to be complemented by a set of components that should be reinforced and strengthened to reduce losses after natural disasters, – said assistant professor of civil engineering at IITGN.
