[Silverio Casulli] «The resilience of electricity infrastructure is a central topic within the new energy and climate scenario: improving the resilience of the electricity system represents one of the main challenges of the energy transition under way. But what does resilience mean? It is the ability of the system and its components to absorb and withstand stresses that exceed the limits of the system itself and to return to normal operation quickly and efficiently. Extreme weather events have tripled over the past 40 years: that of resilience is therefore a relevant topic that must be addressed with new solutions and innovative interventions.»
[Silverio Casulli] «We are Silverio Casulli and [Francesca Scavo] Francesca Scavo and we work together as part of the Planning Team for Grid Safety and Resilience. Today, we will understand how Terna is facing the challenges posed by climate change to ensure an increased safety, reliability and sustainability of its transmission grid.»
[Jingle with speaker] Sala Dati, the monthly podcast by Terna that explores the world of electricity consumption in Italy
[Francesca Scavo] «Climate change is due to the constant increase in concentration of the main greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and to the resulting increase in temperatures, and is having increasingly serious impacts on a global level. It is now clear that severe weather events have become the daily representation of the effects of global warming, as we are also witnessing in Italy. Fr the infrastructure part of the Italian transmission grid too, this entails an increased risk of damage and outages that will only escalate in the future: all this will occur if no targeted prevention and mitigation measures are implemented. The analysis of historic events that have hit the infrastructure managed by Terna over the past few years shows that two main types of weather events are among the leading risk factors: the formation of sleeves of wet snow, i.e. accumulations of snow of a cylindrical shape on the conductors that cause short circuits or structural failures as they weigh down the lines, and strong winds, which causes infrastructural damages mainly as a result of falling trees. Just think that, over the past 10 years, almost 400 weather events involving strong wind and snow have occurred, with relevant impacts on the electricity system and which caused infrastructural damage as well as an electricity blackout of almost 19 GWh. Silverio, explain how Terna is facing climate change and managing its impact on its infrastructures on a daily basis?»
[Silverio Casulli] «The outages, together with the rapidity with which climate change manifests its increasingly severe and intense changes, make it necessary to tackle the climate crisis in progress with an approach which no longer looks to the past but which assesses the future occurrence of severe weather events and their impact on the electricity grid. Having a resilient infrastructure, i.e. one that can absorb and withstand the possible damage caused by these extreme weather events, limiting their impact on final consumers, therefore becomes an enabling factor to face climate change. Francesca, can you tell us how we assess the resilience of the Italian electricity system?»
[Francesca Scavo] «Starting from 2020, Terna has worked on a new method for the resilience of the electricity infrastructure. It is a “risk-based” method which, through the use of climate forecast maps and detailed models representing the electricity infrastructure, enables us to “measure” the impact caused by different types of threat - such as strong winds and snow - in terms of energy outages, considering simultaneous outages on multiple lines. Therefore, this methodology aims to be a tool that enables Terna to identify the areas most at risk and to plan measures to improve the resilience of the electricity system in an effective and efficient manner through preventive, mitigation, restoration and monitoring interventions.»
[Silverio Casulli] «In addition, the Metodologia Resilienza was approved by Arera, the Italian Regulatory Authority for Energy, Networks and Environment, in 2022 and its application has enabled Terna to draft the third edition of its Resilience plan in 2023, in which it presents the initiatives deployed, amounting to over €800 million. In collaboration with RSE (Ricerca sul Sistema Energetico), we have conducted a study that has analysed the frequency and extent of extreme weather events, their impact on network infrastructures and the type of assets involved. This has enabled us to identify a series of specific interventions to minimize the risk of the electrical service being interrupted. They include preventive measures to reduce system exposure to severe weather events; solutions to reduce the time needed to restore assets following outages; and predictive monitoring activities to anticipate critical weather situations which could affect the grid.»
[Silverio Casulli] This has been Silverio Casulli and [Francesca Scavo] Francesca Scavo and you’ve been listening to the eighth episode of Sala Dati, the podcast about electricity consumption in Italy explained by Terna professionals.»
