TEMPER establishes the foundational data and modelling capability required for SSEN Distribution to quantify how a changing climate will alter the failure behaviour of its network. Using poles and overhead-line conductors as a proof-of-concept, the project will:

• Construct a new asset-failure methodology that apportions historical fault data to individual assets using asset information, maintenance and repair records, and engineer input.
• Train climate focused failure-probability models against forward climate projections.
• Recommend changes to SSEN’s data, systems and processes to improve asset failure information.
• Model scenarios for future climate related regulatory metrics and ensure that the new models and data quality recommendations are working towards SSEN being in a proactive position going forward.

Benefits

The project delivers a foundational, transferable capability for asset risk modelling. Specifically:

• A failure method that utilises feeder-level fault records for asset-level failure evidence, validated against engineer and subject matter expert (SME) input, providing a detailed asset-level failure dataset for the chosen asset class.
• Climate-focused probability-of-failure outputs for poles and overhead-line conductors under forward climate scenarios, demonstrating what is possible with current data and where the limits sit.
• A set of data-quality and system-change recommendations specifying how SSEN should evolve its fault-recording, asset-register and maintenance systems to support granular, climate-aware risk modelling at scale.
• A forward-looking position on emerging Ofgem climate-resilience metrics, ensuring SSEN is configured to lead rather than follow on future price-control evaluations.
• A review and investigation of how the modelling output can support sub-regional, asset-level intervention decisions (for example targeted wood-to-steel structure replacement in elevated-hazard locations), giving the business a blueprint for translating climate risk into investment choices.
• An opportunity for SSEN to implement new processes and policy to pro-actively intervene for at-risk assets and reduce the likelihood of power outages.