We present a QUBO (Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization) form for the optimization of electrical grid topologies, as a function of the state of its electrical maneuver elements, in order to minimize the energy loss in case of distribution channel malfunction. This QUBO form is aimed to its resolution in quantum computers, both gate-based and annealers, and in realistic cases needs only \(\mathcal {O}(\sqrt{N})\) qubits, where N is the number of possible connections on the grid. We also show that, for a certain important subset of electrical grids, an approximation can be taken to make the problem local. Moreover, we show that adding a single degree of freedom to the problem, all topologies become exactly local-even without the need of the approximation.