When Hurricane Beryl hit Texas last summer, it resulted in widespread devastation to regional energy infrastructure. CenterPoint Energy, which provides electrical power to Houston and southern Texas, faced over $7 billion in damage to their operating zones. As a result, they’re planning to invest as much as $2.7 billion in resiliency efforts to fortify their operations and proactively guard against weather-related crises going forward.
They are not alone. Over the last year, Tampa Electric in Florida, Entergy in Louisiana and LUMA Energy in Puerto Rico were also caught off guard by hurricanes and suffered widespread outages and storm-induced damage.
While no energy provider is completely immune to the effects of extreme weather, much of this damage could have been prevented with more acute visibility into the hurricane’s progression, advanced knowledge of exactly when it would make landfall, where it would strike, and hourly updates leading up to that point.
Had CenterPoint (and state emergency management agencies) been equipped with this information even hours earlier, for instance, they could have taken precautions and prevented at least some of the loss.
In the energy industry specifically, it’s critical that utilities and other organizations trusted to keep essential infrastructure running for entire communities have access to precision weather data. This means going beyond what the public’s seeing on their weather apps or local news stations, and filling all known visibility gaps in their regions. Not only will this help them manage and prepare for risk in the face of extreme weather like hurricanes, it will also enable them to optimize operations affected by everyday shifts in weather that can have a surprisingly large impact on supply, demand and the cost and availability of service to users.
While this year’s hurricane season has been relatively mild compared to recent years, the energy industry must remain alert. Even tropical storms that don’t strengthen into hurricanes–and hurricanes that don’t make landfall–can have cascading effects on offshore rigs and shipping routes. And knowing about hurricanes that will make landfall even 6, 12 or 24 hours in advance can save both lives – and millions of dollars – if companies have a plan in place to keep operations running smoothly.
Energy companies have risk management plans–most need to update them, starting with better weather visibility.
Energy companies rely on the predictability of their operations–from power grids and offshore rigs to renewable energy generation. Being able to consistently deliver power to customers, even in extreme circumstances, requires planning ahead to predict how damage to infrastructure will lead to outages, when output will be low and when one energy source needs to be supplemented by others.
Resolving this issue requires that energy companies place weather data front and center of their new risk management strategies.
This might seem like a given when it comes to offsetting weather-related risks, but at best, energy companies often have only a couple of people on staff tasked with understanding how the weather will affect their operations. Rather than a siloed and sparse team, energy companies are now introducing cross-functional meteorology units that share pertinent weather data throughout the company to inform. decisions at all levels of the company–from the board room to ground crews.
Additionally, gone are the days when energy companies only had a handful of days, or hours, to prepare for events like hurricanes. With advanced weather modeling, plans can be formalized to include key steps to be taken up to two weeks in advance of an actual storm hitting. By baking in additional time and additional weather visibility, the energy industry will be more resilient – and better positioned for success.
Energy grids across the U.S. remain vulnerable to severe weather, but they’re not totally helpless against it if they plan in advance how to fortify infrastructure and safely dispatch ground crews. Doing this, of course, means having advanced notice–not just that a storm will hit the region, but street-by-street visibility weather conditions.
For instance, after Hurricane Beryl last year, Entergy Texas reported that 651 poles, 304 transformers and 855 crossarms were damaged.An additional 171 miles of downed wire were strewn across the southern part of the state.
Hyper-local forecasts can prevent–or at least, offset–scenarios like this by giving utilities advanced insight into which power lines are most likely to go down in which neighborhoods. Equipped with this type of knowledge days or even weeks in advance, they can fortify at-risk poles. They can additionally track the number and locations of transformers at the highest risk of getting flooded out and determine which substations are most likely to get damaged (something that can take out entire regions of the grid).
All of this information should further inform action plans they can be deployed at a moment’s notice, including dispatching ground crews to at-risk grid zones, positioning them for quick response to danger and, ultimately, ensuring they can safely exit the path of the hurricane.
With hyper-local visibility into the storm’s path, utilities can additionally implement vegetation management strategies to preemptively account for tree branches at risk of falling on public roads and private property.
For energy production facilities, such as the BP-operated Argos platform in the Gulf of America, knowing exactly when a hurricane will strike and how intense it will be can save billions of dollars in lost revenue. In September and November last year, for instance, unplanned outages from hurricanes and tropical storms resulted in a loss of 16% and 5%, respectively, total crude oil production in the region.
Shutting down an oil rig can be a multi-day process, so companies need to be able to make a call as to whether they will need to shut down or if they can continue operating well in advance of a storm’s approach. Each hour it’s down is incredibly costly, so knowing that they can safely operate for another 6, 12 or 24 hours makes a significant difference–and avoiding unnecessary shutdowns is optimal.
Because these rigs are so vulnerable to hurricanes, operators not only need to know if and when a hurricane will make landfall, but also what a category 1 vs. category 3 or 5 hurricane translates to operationally. Are loose objects on the rig secured? Is there a plan in place–including helicopters on standby–to safely evacuate employees?
Needless to say, companies like BP have begun incorporating weather into their risk mitigation plans to greater degrees.
In the U.S., Texas produces 26% of America’s total wind production, making it the leading state for wind power. Additionally, in Florida, solar power accounts for over 9% of total electricity output.
Combined, this leads to billions of dollars in valuable renewable energy equipment and miles of vulnerable facilities that must be protected from hurricanes and other damaging weather. Fortunately, companies that manage these renewable energy operations already have specific plans in place to limit disruptions and damage when they know a storm is on its way.
At solar fields in Florida operations, crews can reposition panels to avoid the strongest wind directions. Or, if a storm is projected to be severe enough, they’re able to store the most vulnerable equipment in advance.
In Texas, wind farms that are determined to be in a storm’s path can put their air turbines into lower power or safe modes. This allows them to protect the internal machinery of equipment that is too large to store.
Should solar panels or wind turbines be expected to go offline for certain periods, energy grids can shift production to natural gas, oil or electricity. Planning ahead for this will further minimize disruptions, enhance protections for local customers and residents, and minimize costs incurred from having to funnel in emergency fuel.
Energy industry executives that incorporate both minute-by-minute forecasts and weather models that predict storms weeks to months in advance into their risk management strategies not only know exactly what to do, but when to do it.
Last year, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce found that, on average, for every $1 that regions spend on climate resilience and preparedness, they save $13 in damages and cleanup costs. Creating risk management strategies that prioritize hurricane tracking and other extreme weather also protects the lives of both workers and local residents.
By introducing cross-functional meteorology teams and creating structured plans that can go into effect as early as weeks in advance of a storm, the energy industry can preserve their facilities and grids, while also running efficient and safe operations.
Peter Childs is Chief Weather Scientist at Climavision, where he leads the company’s global forecasting operations and AI-powered weather models. Peter has decades of experience in both the public sector and global energy companies. He applies his on-the-ground understanding of both to operationalize the use of weather data to inform everyday and future-facing decisions by utilities, energy traders and beyond.
