Abstract: Before the flood season of this year approaches, the State Grid Henan Electric Power Company has readied itself through a comprehensive digital transformation, upgrading its equipment and improving service to ensure an effective response to extreme weather events.

On the morning of July 10, a 3,000 KW medium-voltage generator truck was running at full power at the intersection of Jingnan 14th Road and Mingli Road in the Economic and Technological Development Zone in Zhengzhou, the capital city of Henan Province, supplying electricity to nearby residential communities. Accompanying it were supporting vehicles like a mobile box-type transformer truck, a low-voltage generator truck and a fuel transport truck. This was part of an emergency drill organized by the State Grid Henan Electric Power Company, aimed at ensuring the power supply for the residents by improving the company’s capability through simulating a variety of power supply scenarios likely to occur during the flood season.

Due to global warming, China has seen an increase in extreme weather in recent years, with heavy rains, floods, droughts, snow and natural disasters hitting the country on multiple occasions. To truly implement the requirements of "people first, life first," and to prevent and reduce the impact of natural disasters on the power grid, the company has taken multiple measures to strengthen the line of defense against flood control.

Accelerating the digital transformation of flood control of the power grid: The State Grid Henan has developed an integrated “Flood Control Map” platform that combines six different layers, including maps of flood storage areas and detention basins, hydrologic maps, power grid network charts and maps showing heavy rainfall distribution. This multi-layered approach meets the diverse needs of decision-making and dispatching, enabling precise and strategic flood control. 
 
Furthermore, the company has established a “Meteorological Data Service Center for Individual Enterprises.” This platform devises tailored emergency response plans for eight types of extreme weather events, reducing the time needed for emergency repair and power restoration by 40 percent, significantly enhancing the power grid’s resilience against disasters and improving the efficiency in restoring power after natural disaster-induced outages.

Increasing investment for flood control equipment

Taking lessons from the catastrophic flood disaster occurred on July 20, 2021 in Zhengzhou, the State Grid Henan has significantly upgraded its flood control equipment across the province, with the deployment of 96 water-discharging cabins, 7 mobile substations, 20 large beacons, 15 high-capacity water-discharging trucks, and 25 medium-voltage generator trucks. 
 
Additionally, the company has established “three lines of defense” for 372 key flood control substations and created “safety dikes” for 384 critical transmission lines. It  has also implemented measures to construct protective structures for 897 essential distribution substations. What is most important, however, is that it has set up a project benchmark, a Zhengzhou Railway Bureau's project that allows to relocate a distribution substation from underground to aboveground.

These initiatives have bolstered the company's capacity to manage severe flooding, significantly enhancing its flood response capabilities.

Enhancing customer service

The State Grid Henan has shifted from the traditional equipment-centered management approach to a new power supply service model centered on residential communities. Thanks partly to data verification and record-keeping for 35,000 residential communities, this model has led to the integration of equipment, communities and customers.
The company has also developed an innovative “Digital Command Platform for Emergency Repair and Power Restoration” designed for residential areas, providing visual representations of outages, repair efforts, and power restoration activities, along with their locations and impact. This ensures clear visibility of the number and locations of residential communities, accurate reporting of outages, and easy identification of emergency repair sites, which has led to the reinforcement of the company’s commitment to delivering reliable public services.

As a result, these measures have greatly enhanced the flood control and power supply capabilities of the power grid in Henan. During the super typhoon Doksuri in 2023 and the severe storms in early July this year, the State Grid Henan ensured the safe and reliable operation of the power grid, providing robust support for social and economic development and people’s lives.

At this critical moment of flood control this year, the State Grid Henan remains on high alert. It has set up an emergency repair team of 20,000 members in 1,233 units, which are fully equipped with flood control vehicles and materials. This team remains on 24-hour standby, ready to respond to emergencies and ensure safe and reliable power supply to the public.