Lights-Out After Hurricane Michael: A Spatially Informed Bayesian Network Analysis of Power Outages

abstract:Historically, dense vegetation cover near buildings has caused power disruptions during weather phenomena. These types of severe storms impact the coast of Florida each year. However, challenges exist for obtaining both power outage data and calculating the impact of tree cover. NASA's Nighttime Lights, Black Marble, VNP46 product is utilized to analyze the natural and built environments. One aspect of the built environment that can be mapped with the Black Marble data is the megawatts of electricity used by the electrical power grid based on the magnitude of emitted nighttime light energy. This paper discusses using Black Marble data and other landscape variables within a probabilistic model to examine spatial patterns and map electricity outages with Bayesian networks. The research results indicate a high probability of a significant power outage when dense vegetation is present, but nuances in our natural and built environments like electric substations and land cover type alter the chance of reducing energy emissions.