As the spring severe storm season ramps up across the Midwest, an electric utility provider in Oklahoma is turning to drone technology in an effort to reduce the length of power outages following bad weather.

Drones are being used across the country to assess damage to the power grid following extreme weather events. The drones can be used for visual inspections in rural areas where power companies like Oklahoma Gas & Electric used to spend countless hours driving roads.

“Our whole industry has an interest in this,” OG&E spokeswoman Kathleen O’Shea told the Norman, Oklahoma Transcript. “We used drones for the first time to assess damage in the Woodward area following Winter Storm Jupiter in January.”

Drones get into the air faster than a helicopter and can provide video of downed power lines and other damaged equipment.

With tornado season on the horizon and the threat of other severe weather events ranging from flooding to straight line winds, hail or other natural disasters like wildfires and earthquakes, the ability to use drones could help speed up the recovery process by enabling power companies to assess and identify damaged areas and restore power more quickly.

“Drones have become a prominent topic of interest among utility providers in Oklahoma and across the country,” O’Shea said. “In the past, we’ve used helicopters, and we’ll still use them as necessary. However, drones can be deployed faster than helicopters in most scenarios.

“We estimate that we shaved off approximately a half day of assessment time by using drones.”

The Edison Electric Institute identifies three ways drones help protect the power grid by improving:

• Resiliency by quickly assessing damage from disasters, speeding power restoration

• Reliability through inspection of remote infrastructure, identifying issues before they become problems

• Security by using routine drone flights to enhance energy grid security

OG&E plans to contract drone service to aid storm recovery efforts but also plans “to develop partnerships with local educational institutions for other applications,” O’Shea said.

“We’re discussing a number of potential uses such as inspecting power distribution lines, inspecting wind farm turbines, and inspecting the inside of power plant equipment like boilers and stacks,” O’Shea said. “We have an internal team to review what other work activity we would use drones for. We want to make sure we have policies in place to that you don’t invade someone’s privacy.”

Drones must be registered with the Federal Aviation Administration and pilots follow an industry standard of conduct as well as complying with federal, state and local laws, according to EII.

The FAA calls drones unmanned aircraft systems, or UASs, and has strict guidelines for pilots and UAS operation. Operators must be certified through the FAA, pass Transportation Security Administration vetting and are required to inspect the drones before flight. Drones operate in accord with limits on altitude, clearance and speed.

OG&E is also incorporating advanced planning to reduce the duration of storm-related power outages, O’Shea said.

When major storms are predicted, the company will set up staging areas and secure extra crews a few days in advance, a tactic OG&E used in January. Estimates indicate that planning reduced the time of outages by 50 percent.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signed House Bill 2599 last May to restrict flight of unmanned aircraft over locations and businesses that are completely fenced in or have signs to prevent intruders, including infrastructure such as electric power generation facilities. Government, law enforcement, the owners of the critical infrastructure facility and operators authorized by the FAA to conduct operations over that airspace are exempt under the law, which went into effect in November.

Hampton writes for the Norman, Oklahoma Transcript.