Context: Service quality declines not because interruptions occur, but because recovery takes longer than necessary, reflecting how decisively teams respond once power is disrupted.

Challenges: Interruptions are detected, but priorities aren't set quickly, crews are reassigned as conditions shift, and critical links between switching, access, and repair surface too late, with each missed handoff extending the next.

Solution: The Service Restoration Guidance Agent, an AI agent built using Microsoft Copilot Studio, monitors outage duration trends as restoration unfolds and intervenes during crew dispatch and escalation, flagging outages trending toward a longer-than-expected window before avoidable delay accumulates.

Impact: Utilities following this approach see priorities set earlier and restoration paths stay clear, with duration and frequency falling as a result of better timing, not better reporting.