Tim Barat cherished his role as a lineman at an electric utility company in Australia, even amid the turmoil of the disastrous Black Saturday bushfires in 2009, which ravaged over 1 million acres and left numerous individuals without power or homes. However, upon relocating to the U.S. in 2013, his wife was not as supportive of him continuing in that vocation.
“My wife was concerned about my safety working with high voltage,” Barat expressed to TechCrunch.
Consequently, he returned to academia, ultimately achieving a master’s degree in electrical engineering from UC Berkeley.
Still, thoughts of power lines lingered in his mind. More specifically, the sounds they made.
“As humans, electricity is imperceptible to us. We can sense it indirectly, and certainly feel the consequences of electrocution,” Barat noted. But neither scenario is conducive to a long-term career. Therefore, linemen rely on their other senses to assess the situations during outages.
“Typically, we rely on our vision and hearing. We can feel the vibrations of transformers and similar apparatus. We also knock on poles with a hammer and listen to the ringing sound to judge if it’s hollow, which is critical for safety before climbing,” he explained.
This method can be exhausting and time-intensive. Utility employees often need to cover extensive distances to pinpoint the source of an outage, whether it’s due to a fallen tree branch on a power line, a squirrel interfering with grounding, or damage caused by high winds. Repair work can only commence once the precise nature and location of the issue have been identified.
“Some utility companies allocate nine figures annually just for these inspections,” Barat stated.
Barat pondered whether there might be a more efficient approach. Reflecting on his experiences as a lineman, he recalled countless moments spent acoustically analyzing various infrastructure. “That’s where my thoughts led me,” he remarked.
In collaboration with Abdulrahman Bin Omar and Hall Chen, Barat established Gridware. The firm’s innovation is a device engineered to listen for electrical malfunctions.
“We perceive the grid as a colossal guitar rather than a mere circuit board,” Barat explained. “It is a tangible entity, and we must
Compiled by Techarena.au.
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