Nicholas was born in Malaysia but was raised on the Big Island of Hawai‘i since he was 1. He graduated from Kea’au High School and attended the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo for 2 years before transferring to the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa to pursue his bachelors in Electrical Engineering. He is also planning on getting his Masters at UH Manoa. Nicholas is the electrical lead of a student-led group called Team RoSE, which stands for Robotics Space Exploration. The team competes at the University Rover Challenge where teams from all over the world compete to have their rover performs tasks a Mars rover might do. After graduation, Nicholas would like to pursue a career in either renewable energy or microwave filter manufacturing. During his free time, Nicholas likes running, playing video and card games, drawing, and cooking.
Home Island: Hawai‘i Island
High School: Kea’au High School
Institution when accepted: UH Manoa
Site: Hawaiian Electric, Hilo, Hawai‘i
Mentors: Kimberly Tabac , Kandice Kubojiri, & Riley Ceria
Project title: Outage Mapping and Analysis for Hawaiian Electric’s Distribution/Transmission Systems
Project Abstract:
Power outages are a common issue across the islands, and reducing their frequency and duration is a significant undertaking. To aid with outage mitigation efforts, historical outage data from 2019 through 2023 will be utilized to assist Hawaiian Electric in developing and prioritizing future mitigation strategies to address reliability and resilience concerns for their transmission and distribution systems. In particular, this project involves analyzing outage records and entering outage cause locations with accompanying information, such as the structure identification number, into a spreadsheet for O‘ahu, Hawai‘i Island, and Maui County. This work is helpful because there is currently no easily accessible data regarding the location of the outages. Each record requires a thorough manual review. If the outage’s cause location cannot be easily determined, other data sources with additional information are used to help determine the necessary information, ensuring accuracy as much as possible. After compiling this data, a spreadsheet will be used to populate the outage cause locations on a Geographical Information System (GIS) map. This map can then be used to visualize the data and help develop mitigations, such as recommending vegetation management, prioritizing asset and wildfire sustainment, installing protective devices, or implementing more complex systems, such as smart loops. These strategies aim to enhance the reliability and resilience of Hawaiian Electric Company’s distribution and transmission systems.