Substation marking to deter thieves
A huge security clampdown has been launched by Central Networks at thousands of electricity sub stations in the West Midlands.
It comes after 650 were broken into by metal thieves last year compared with 480 during the previous 12 months. Equipment is being coated in a forensic liquid called SmartWater which will allow police to prove if something has been stolen and also help them identify scrapyards being used to fence the goods.
The lengths to which the thieves are prepared to go was graphically illustrated earlier this week when a sledgehammer gang smashed down the wall of an empty flat and the wall of the sub station next door in Kitts Green, Birmingham, blacking out 100 homes and firms nearby to steal a small amount of copper wire.
Jonathan Smith from Central Networks commented: “The stupidity of some of these thieves almost beggars belief. We even had one man who cut through an 11,000 volt cable with a hacksaw.”
The SmartWater liquid is now being used to coat sub station equipment. It is only visible under ultraviolet light and contains a forensic code unique to each substation.
Central Networks has almost 94,000 sub stations supplying power to 10 million people across a large swathe of the country stretching from the Lincolnshire coast to parts of Bristol.