Arrives CipCast, software that provides risk from extreme weather events – Adnkronos

Posted on: 03/11/2016 13:32

 Software that allows you to process and provide risk forecasts for energy and water infrastructure in the case of particularly intense weather events such as storms, floods and landslides. It’s called CipCast and has been developed by the Laboratory Analysis and Critical Infrastructure Protection Enea and tested in the control room of Acea Distribuzione in Rome.

 At the application level are two distinct versions were developed: to calculate the impact of rainfall on the electricity distribution networks, and to better manage the events related to the Jubilee in every single area of ​​the Capital. “Once the data acquired from sensors and weather forecasts – said Vittorio Rosato , head of the Laboratory Analysis and Critical Infrastructure Protection Enea – the application processes the risk scenarios, identifies the elements of infrastructure in danger, it estimates the impact on services and quantifies the effects that their possible disruption could produce on citizens and productive system. ” “Having this information – says Rosato – allows the company to not only electricity, but also to those who administer the city and takes care of its security, managing crisis situations and establish an effective means for rapid interventions.”

 Born from the need to face increasingly frequent weather events, intense and characterized by greater dangers in an urban context, the CIPCast software integrates geospatial data, weather forecasts up to one hour (nowcasting) and a short-medium term, with information on set hydrogeological and on the recurrence of earthquakes and other major natural events.

 Between 2010 and the early months of 2015 in Italy we were 43 days of electrical blackouts because of the bad weather. Between 2013 and 2014 there were no less than 5 cases of flooding in large areas of the township, all episodes related to heavy rains concentrated in the space of a few hours. Also in Rome, in just over 5 years of monitoring (from October 2010 to 2015), were 15 extreme events recorded on the map of climate risk and 24 days to stop the subways and suburban trains due to heavy rains (data from the dossier of Legambiente ‘the Italian cities to the climate challenge’).

 The system that Enea is testing in partnership with Acea Distribuzione – and soon to be extended to the control of the Ato2 water supply – is part of the Rome Project (Resilience enhancement of Metropolitan Areas) funded by the Ministry of Education. This initiative takes ‘inspiration’ from technologies developed in the European project CiprNet (Critical Infrastructure Preparedness and Resilience Research Network) for the Competence Centres Risk Analysis of European Critical Infrastructure that will provide 24 hours 24 the analysis of risk critical infrastructures with a prediction from a few hours to a few days.

 The system – such as the one under investigation in Rome – will allow to give directions to the Civil Protection and Local Authorities for strategies and actions to be put in place to reduce the impact of weather events and effectively restore services.

 “Preserving the electricity network from any failure or disruption is a priority in order to avoid consequences for the population and the so-called domino effect, ie an extended blackout of other critical infrastructures that provide essential services such as drinking water, waste disposal, rail traffic and telecommunications, “said Mauritius Pollino , a researcher at the Laboratory Analysis and Protection of Critical Infrastructures Enea.