an Diego Gas & Electric is upgrading its infrastructure and expanding its use of technology to limit the risk of wildfires and reduce the time it takes to restore service afterward.
More than 14,000 wooden power poles have been replaced by steel versions, special cameras have been placed on 16 mountaintops and 177 weather stations are monitoring winds and moisture, an SDG&E official told a City Council committee last week.
The public utility is also jointly working on a new fire behavior modeling analysis with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Prevention and UCLA.
The goal of the analysis is to determine which direction a fire is likely to move when it starts and what structures it might threaten, SDG&E meteorologist Brian D’Agostino told the Infrastructure Committee.
In addition, the utility recently established a new Fire Science and Climate Adaptation Department to monitor, track and mitigate the effects of wildfires and climate change on SDG&E infrastructure.