Kenta Takagi

Research on preparedness for power outages caused by heavy snowfall

Professor Yoko Matsuda

In recent years, natural disasters have become increasingly severe in Japan, causing extensive damage in many areas. Natural disasters sometimes trigger the severing of lifelines. In particular, power outages caused by heavy snowfall are expected to be serious due to changes in snowfall patterns and the aging of the population. In this study, the author focused on the power outage caused by heavy snowfall in Nagaoka City, Niigata Prefecture, in December 2022, to understand the problems that people face when the power goes out, and compared them with general power outages that are not caused by heavy snowfall, and discussed how to prepare for power outages caused by heavy snowfall.
Interviews with community leaders revealed that the power outage that occurred in December 2022 was unprecedented. The telephone wires were also damaged by fallen trees, and it became clear that the town's crisis response system, which is based on telephone communication, did not function, and calls from the city office to confirm the safety of the residents were not answered adequately.
A survey was conducted in Ozumi-cho, where many power outages occurred. The results show that about 90% of the households were without power for 24 hours or more after the power outage occurred, indicating that the power outage was long-term. The respondents tended to have a high degree of difficulty in obtaining information on power outages, bathing, lighting, and measures against cold, while they had a low degree of difficulty with refrigerators/freezers. The level of difficulty was low for refrigerators and freezers.
In the event of heavy snowfall, evacuation and shopping will be difficult unless the snow is removed, and this will be especially burdensome for the elderly. Therefore, it is important to be prepared with snow removal tools other than shovels. Cooperation with neighbors is also considered essential. In particular, in areas where many elderly people live, it is necessary to promote community-based disaster prevention efforts, such as snow drills, in order to reduce the burden on the elderly.