Use Case Description
Understanding the exposure of infrastructure assets to environmental threats and human interactions is a key element in the conceptualisation of planning, maintenance, and repair measures. The necessary efforts must be appropriately scaled and effectively allocated. Seasonal variations and natural disasters impact energy infrastructure, in the worst cases causing major economic damage, and are therefore highly significant factors to consider.
Describing the surroundings of assets is first undertaken at the national level, then refined into hyper-localised information. This provides the baseline for asset- or project-specific risk assessments. Individual power pylons or line segments are evaluated against multiple hazard criteria, such as exposure to flooding, erosion, drought, landslides, critical land cover change, earthquakes, wildfires, and more. This high spatial resolution offers a distinct advantage in enabling the equitable distribution of financial resources.
EO technologies combine long-term records with the most recent environmental developments, particularly relevant given the inevitable increase in extreme events linked to ongoing climate change, providing a comprehensive picture to support informed decision-making.