We are developing an innovative application that revolutionizes powerline grid planning by providing comprehensive environmental and geographical insights. Our solution helps planners make informed decisions by integrating multiple data layers, we enable more sustainable and environmentally conscious infrastructure planning.

We are ProstěTeam, a group of students - Barča, Jarda, Michal, and Vojta.

The Problem

The construction of new lines faces many challenges today. When planning a route, it is necessary to take into account many different criteria from an environmental perspective, such as deforestation, floodplains, national parks, erosion risks, and more. The planning process is slowed down by the fact that designers must search for data in many different places and combine the effects of individual factors in an appropriate manner themselves. The risk of human error is high.

Our solution

We have developed a service that allows users to view all relevant data on a single map. New data can be added to the map as additional layers in the form of GeoJSON or other vector files. We have also created an environmental index that uses data from the added layers to calculate how suitable a given location is for building a power line tower—for example, in a protected landscape area or flood zone, the index is 0 (do not build here), in a forest the index is lower than in a field, and so on.

A web application built with TypeScript, Next.js, and React, using Leaflet as the map renderer. It allows adding map data layers (e.g., GeoJSON) on top of the map. The app runs in Docker and works on mobile, though performance is not optimized. The code includes an algorithm to calculate an environmental index based on a formula that incorporates user-defined priorities.

Impact

The result of our efforts is a tool that allows designers to obtain all the data they need for their work in a fraction of the time. If it were to be further developed correctly, its focus could be expanded from the environment to other factors, such as land management or consideration of existing infrastructure. The index we have created could also easily be used to develop an algorithm for finding the optimal power line route.

Feasibility & financials

We have a functional, very low-cost demo that demonstrates our idea is feasible. We use free open-source data. However, if the reliability of this data proves insufficient, it would be necessary to purchase some data. Additionally, funding would be required for further development and for hosting the service on a high-performance machine. However, by speeding up the process, we eliminate significant expenses (including costs of repeatedly planning the same route due to changing circumstances).

What is new about your solution

Our solution introduces a new way of combining all data relevant to the power line route designer, enabling them to quickly, efficiently, and reliably take environmental requirements into account. Until now, there have been many different sources with varying levels of relevance, but the outcome of our work is the ability to unify data from all these sources into a single tool The idea of calculating an environmental index enables a new way to account for the varying levels of relevance of different environmental factors. This makes it possible to truly find the best location for building individual pylons and the entire power line. It also opens the door to developing algorithms for finding the shortest route using this index as a criterion, evaluating existing routes to determine if a better path exists nearby, or generating a heatmap of optimal pylon placement by running the calculation across the entire map.

Data Sources for Future Solution

These are some of the data sources we plan to integrate into our solution to provide even more comprehensive environmental insights:

Preview	Data Layer	Source URL
	Global Forest Change (Deforestation)	https://earthenginepartners.appspot.com/
	Mines and undermined areas	https://mapy.geology.cz/dulni_dila_poddolovani/#
	Urban planning / Land-use plan (for example for Havlíčkův Brod)	https://mapy.kr-vysocina.cz/pupo_pfa/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=61cce275226a49a69c5b95254afda53...
	Slope deformations and landslides	https://mapy.geology.cz/svahove_deformace/#
	Europe bird migration map	https://bbecquet.net/articles/2022/05/bird-tracking-map/
	Snow, wind and earthquake-prone areas	https://www.dlubal.com/cs/oblasti-zatizeni-snehem-vetrem-a-zemetresenim/snih-csn-en-1991-1-3.html?&c...
	Floods zones	https://chmi.maps.arcgis.com/apps/instant/sidebar/index.html?appid=34fa7f95912b4be3b9d8e3f856dac0ad

What comes next

We would like to continue developing the application. Possible improvements are:

• Adding additional specific data layers (e.g. bee protection zones, land management registry, bird migration routes).
• Optimizing the map renderer to handle these data sources smoothly and without lag.
• Calculating a heatmap for a defined area to support route generation or selection of the optimal path for power line towers.
• Developing algorithms that leverage the environmental index (e.g. shortest route within a set threshold, evaluating existing infrastructure).