Since 2010, over 7 million acres a year have burned because of wildfires. I personally had a family member just last year who lost their home to a wildfire in the state of Oregon. This is a huge problem for us, and we as the energy market have a responsibility to do everything we can to mitigate the risk.
8% of all wildfires are caused by power utilities. This may seem like a small number but you have to remember that the reason wires are falling out of the air or equipment is failing is usually because of a crazy weather event. That means those fires are more likely to spread and become tragic to the people in effected areas.
I started my fire mitigation journey over a decade ago working in southern California for an electric utility. At the time, I had no idea safer optical sensing technology even existed. Back then, Micatu wasn't around to solve the problem. Now we have sensing solutions to get the data you need to operate your system without introducing sparking risks. By being completely nonconductive and leveraging the physics of optical technology, we're able to get that data to keep your lines and your communities safe.
So the question for you is, how can we mitigate some of these risks? My answer is to look at the equipment you have out there today. How can we get that data in a more responsible and safe way? By moving towards optical, we can eliminate risks and help us live in a safer environment.
By leveraging bulk optical technology, we're able to eliminate one of the fire risks out there that you find in traditional instrument transformers. Because we're completely electrically immune from the grid, we ride through anomalies instead of exploding from those anomalies.
Micatu's solution is a full line measurement platform of optical sensor technology. Whether it be measuring on overhead lines, underground lines, or anything in between, we have a solution that can fit your needs, that's easily deployable, modular and gives you that really important operational data you need to run your system efficiently. We're measuring at 0.5% accuracy, which is amazing for all of your different applications. We're looking at voltage, current, power quality measurements and harmonics. We're here to help you not only gain that visibility, but to leverage that data into your operational technology and drive that ROI as you're also increasing safety and doing things the right way for your grid.
To learn more about the factors affecting today's grid—and how optical sensing offers a safer, more reliable solution—download our whitepaper A Grid Disrupted: Optical Sensing Technology for a Smarter, Safer Grid.