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Global Warming Drives Increasing Tropical Cyclone-Induced U.S. Electric Power Outage Risk
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  • Julian R Rice,
  • Karthik Balaguru,
  • Andrea Staid,
  • Wenwei Xu,
  • David Judi
Julian R Rice
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Karthik Balaguru
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (DOE)
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Andrea Staid
Electric Power Research Institute
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Wenwei Xu
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
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David Judi
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
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Abstract

While power outages caused by tropical cyclones (TCs) already pose a great threat to coastal communities, how—and why—these risks will change in a warming climate is poorly understood. To address this need, we develop a robust machine learning model to capture TC-induced power outage risk. When applied to 900,000 synthetic TCs downscaled from simulated historical and future climate conditions under a strong warming scenario, we find outage risk in the United States and Puerto Rico is expected to increase broadly by the end of the century, with some states seeing increases of 60% and higher. Further, we discover that rising rainfall rates will play an increasingly important role in TC-induced power outage risk as the climate changes, explaining more than 50% of the projected change in risk in some regions. These insights are important for guiding decision-makers in their future outage risk investment and mitigation plans.
23 Jul 2024Submitted to ESS Open Archive
26 Jul 2024Published in ESS Open Archive