How Smart Grids Reduce Power Outages for Utilities

Author Sticky

Rebecca Gu

Senior Director, Product Management - GridOS Distribution Management Systems Product Portfolio

Grid Software, GE Vernova

Rebecca Gu is a Senior Director at GE Vernova, supporting the GridOS Distribution Management Systems Product portfolio.  She supports our utility customers on all aspects of distribution grid modernization and energy transition challenges from renewables integration, to integrating new AMI analytics for grid management. Prior to her role on distribution management, she was the Senior Manager for the Distributed Energy Resources Management Systems portfolio.  On DERMS, Rebecca led the vision for Distribution System Operations and management of market-based or transactive energy solutions using DER, and expanded the DERMS partner ecosystem to include Edge DERMS solutions and market solutions providers.

Jun 19, 2025 Last Updated
3 minutes

Increasingly severe weather events, growing renewables integration, higher loads from EVs and data centers, and aging infrastructure; compounding challenges are making the risk of outages and power grid disruptions an ever-common occurrence for utilities companies.

Avoiding outages is one of the primary advantages of achieving a “smart grid,” or a grid that uses advanced digital technology to improve the efficiency, reliability, and sustainability of electricity production and distribution. Utilities with smart grids have access to numerous advanced capabilities that can minimize outage situations.
GE Vernova

What are the key smart grid features that reduce outages?

  1. Real-Time Monitoring and Diagnostics: Smart grids utilize advanced sensors and communication technologies to monitor the electricity network in real time. This allows for the rapid detection of faults and anomalies, enabling quicker response times to address issues before they lead to lengthy, widespread outages.
  2. Automated Control Systems: Applications such as Fault Location, Isolation and Service Restoration (FLISR) can automatically reroute power and isolate faulted areas, minimizing the impact of outages. This automation helps maintain service to unaffected areas and reduces the duration and scale of outages.
  3. Proactive Vegetation Management. Falling trees have long been a leading cause of power grid outages – and this is increasingly common as severe weather events happen more frequently. All utilities employ some form of utility vegetation management software to protect their assets; however, traditional strategies can be inefficient and imprecise. Smart grids offer access to intelligent UVM solutions like GridOS® Visual Intelligence (VI). VI overlays vegetation imagery from satellites, LiDAR scans, and conventional photography with network maps, relying on a simple, yet vivid color-coding scheme to show trimming crews the precise areas in need of UVM. This makes trimming activities more efficient and precise, helping to prevent damage and extend the equipment life.
  4. Automated Grid Balancing. Renewable energy generation is intermittent in nature. Smart grids often have access to systems that can both sense impending power shortages and determine appropriate countermeasures, such as drawing power from other sources with plentiful supply.
  5. Predictive Maintenance: With the data collected by smart grid technologies, utilities can perform predictive maintenance on infrastructure. This proactive approach helps identify components or equipment that may fail soon, allowing preemptive repairs or replacements to prevent outages. Certain technologies can detect an impending failure based on digital metrics of an asset’s performance, or imagery showing physical defects such as corrosion or fraying wires.
  6. Distributed Energy Resource (DER) Management Capabilities: Integration of DERs, such as solar panels and battery storage systems, provides additional resilience. Smart grids can leverage intelligent Distributed Energy Resource Management Systems (DERMS) solutions to expedite the integration process and constantly monitor and optimize connected resources. In the event of a power disruption, smart grids can draw upon their local DERs as a temporary source of additional power, thus minimizing or even completely avoiding an outage situation.
  7. Enhanced Communication: Smart grids improve communication between utilities and consumers, providing alerts and updates during outages. This transparency helps manage expectations and can ensure quicker recovery efforts and a better overall customer experience.
Overall, smart grids enhance the reliability and resilience of electricity networks, ultimately leading to fewer and shorter outages. For more information on how grid software can help reduce outage situations, check out our GridOS ebook.

Author Section

Author

Rebecca Gu

Senior Director, Product Management - GridOS Distribution Management Systems Product Portfolio
Grid Software, GE Vernova

Rebecca Gu is a Senior Director at GE Vernova, supporting the GridOS Distribution Management Systems Product portfolio.  She supports our utility customers on all aspects of distribution grid modernization and energy transition challenges from renewables integration, to integrating new AMI analytics for grid management. Prior to her role on distribution management, she was the Senior Manager for the Distributed Energy Resources Management Systems portfolio.  On DERMS, Rebecca led the vision for Distribution System Operations and management of market-based or transactive energy solutions using DER, and expanded the DERMS partner ecosystem to include Edge DERMS solutions and market solutions providers.