Fiber optic sensors could one day catch thieves who steal electricity and materials from overhead power lines. The UK firm Bandweaver recently demonstrated a distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) system that detects invasion and interruption on power lines. The system does this by using back-scattering effects along an optical fiber.

The Cost of Tampering A major global problem is tampering and theft from power lines. In fact, this activity costs the electric industry an estimated $96 billion a year. Tampering can also interrupt power supplies and lead to operating losses for power companies and national grids.

Detecting and identifying theft when it first happens is the key to solving this problem. The power industry generally sees current solutions as time consuming, inefficient and expensive.