Social vulnerability to long-duration power outages in Brazil

Natural disasters and extreme weather events have caused long-duration power outages in Brazil in recent years, partly due to the lack of resilience of the power grid. These outages can have disastrous impacts on the lives and livelihoods of the people who lose access to electricity. These impacts are most severe for socially vulnerable populations who struggle to prepare for or recover from a power outage. However, no index of social vulnerability specific to power outages in Brazil currently exists. To fill this gap, this paper develops an index of social vulnerability to long-duration power outages tailored to Brazil. Results are demonstrated on a case study of Rio de Janeiro using publicly available data to create indices of vulnerability in three dimensions of health, preparedness, and evacuation, as well as an index of overall vulnerability. The vulnerability maps are reported at the municipality, weighting area, and/or census tract levels. The results indicate that the most socially vulnerable regions are also highly susceptible to extreme weather events and natural disasters. The vulnerability maps can be used for targeted decision making in terms of infrastructural hardening, grid reinforcement, and preemptive event preparation as well as to inform risk-based resilient operation strategies. This study also discusses policy barriers and opportunities for vulnerability-informed resilience approaches in Brazil. Overall, this index is a valuable tool for policymakers and electric utilities to understand who is vulnerable during a power outage and to build a more equitable and resilient power grid.