Risk Assessment of High Voltage Power Lines Crossing Forest Areas – A Case Study of Wildfires

Abstract

Abstract. This study aims to introduce new methods for assessing risk of wildfires around power transmission line corridors (PTCs) using multiple sourced active monitoring data. The proposed approach starts from fire analysis using interpretative structural modeling (ISM) from historical data of fire-caused transmission line (TL) fault, which emphasizes on the fire regimes and the fire factors. The ISM illustrates the sequence and relationships among fire factors. The main influencing factors are then ranking using analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to distinguish each relative importance. FRP, a high-resolution fire risk index conducting fire risk around PTCs, was constructed considering these factors as a series of assessment criterion. Variable meteorological-type factors such as maximum temperature and minimum relative humidity, less variable basic elements such as surface conditions, and human activity elements are all weighed and considered in FRP. The risk of this line can be obtained by calculating the collected monitoring data from TLC. Moreover, the safety risk level can be analyzed based on this assessment and the risk map of the power corridor can be used to help the power department to improve the maintenance plan of the power corridor.