In the rapidly evolving energy landscape, utilities face increasing pressure to enhance grid reliability and resilience. Extreme weather events, aging infrastructure and rising energy demand make it imperative for utilities to adopt advanced automation solutions. One of the most effective technologies for improving grid resilience is fault location, isolation and service restoration (FLISR).

FLISR is an advanced distribution automation system that leverages sensors, intelligent switches and real-time communication to detect and respond to faults on the grid. By identifying fault locations, isolating affected areas and automatically rerouting power, FLISR significantly reduces downtime and improves overall system efficiency. This technology enables a more rapid response to disruptions, allowing utilities to maintain service reliability even in the face of severe conditions.

FLISR automates fault detection, reducing the time required to locate disruptions in the grid. With real-time monitoring and smart sensors, utilities can pinpoint the exact location of an issue without manual intervention or truck rolls. By isolating the faulted section, FLISR prevents widespread outages, limiting disruptions to only the affected area. This results in improved SAIDI (system average interruption duration index) and SAIFI (system average interruption frequency index) scores, including customer minutes interrupted (CMI). Additionally, FLISR rapidly restores power by rerouting electricity through alternate pathways, minimizing downtime.

In addition to outage reduction, FLISR optimizes grid operations by enabling automated switching and reconfiguration, allowing utilities to leverage distributed energy resources more effectively. Integration of FLISR with other smart grid technologies enhances coordination between transmission and distribution systems, creating a more flexible and dynamic grid infrastructure. This automation not only improves customer satisfaction but also reduces operational costs associated with manual troubleshooting. By reducing the need for field crews to manually inspect and repair faults, utilities can allocate resources more efficiently and improve workforce safety. With FLISR, utilities can better manage grid disruptions, thereby maintaining a more stable and resilient energy delivery system, even during extreme weather conditions.

Implementing FLISR requires strategic planning, system integration and continuous optimization to maximize its effectiveness. Many utilities have successfully integrated FLISR to enhance grid resilience, reduce restoration times and improve overall reliability. FLISR adoption highlights how real-time decision-making and automation have significantly decreased outage durations and improved response times. The adaptability of FLISR allows it to be tailored to specific grid topologies, making it a scalable solution for utilities of varying sizes and infrastructures.

By leveraging FLISR technology, utilities can create a smarter, more adaptive grid capable of meeting future energy demands and environmental challenges. Investing in FLISR can help utilities build a more robust and efficient power delivery system, maintaining a reliable energy supply for customers and communities. With continued advancements in grid automation and smart technologies, FLISR is poised to remain a cornerstone of modern grid resilience strategies.

The path to FLISR deployment and operation contains many potential hurdles, including:

• Organizations will need strategic alignment and cooperation across multiple groups, including distribution operations, telecommunication engineering and operations, operational technology (OT), and information technology (IT).
• Organizations will need to decide on centralized, decentralized or hybrid FLISR schemes, as well as whether to use an existing distribution management system vendor or a different vendor to implement FLISR control.
• Existing telecommunication networks might not be designed to support the availability, throughput and latency requirements of a modern FLISR or advanced distribution management system deployment and therefore might require enhancements.
• Telecommunication operations groups might not be used to the level of support needed to monitor and manage a FLISR deployment; they may need additional people, process, data and technology aligned to a service management operational structure to support it.
• Distribution operations teams may distrust the failover scheme and want more control over switching capabilities, potentially disabling FLISR during storm or blue-sky days.
• Creation of FLISR schemes requires understanding of the electric grid and components to enable expected resilience enhancements.
• Deploying FLISR devices requires careful coordination among planning, engineering, construction and commissioning teams, both among the utility groups and among selected consultants and vendors.

Partnering with experienced consultants, such as those at Burns & McDonnell and 1898 & Co., can help overcome these challenges. Professionals experienced with FLISR can develop plans and document requirements across grid operations, telecommunications and OT/IT systems to support successful rollouts and enable operations. They can develop governance structures to attain and support continuous alignment across siloed organizations; develop FLISR schemes to protect the grid and support resiliency; and evaluate and provide requirements and recommendations for telecommunication enhancements to support FLISR. Further, the right partners can help enhance network operations centers (NOCs) to align to new operational expectations driven by FLISR deployments.