The electricity supplier is scoping out areas in Raywood and Lockwood and expects works to begin next year.

Twenty-four kilometers of lines will be buried near Raywood and seven kilometers in Lockwood as part of a scheme devised in the aftermath of the Back Saturday bushfires.

Powercor has spent the past month-and-a-half conducting roughly 350 tests of technology designed to clamp down on bushfire risks across western Victoria, with more to come before fire restrictions come into force.

Engineers tested powerlines fed by an Eaglehawk substation on Monday, which was fitted with rapid earth fault current limiters as part of the first round of installations.

The technology automatically reduces power as a fault is detected anywhere along a powerline network, limiting the amount of sparks a damage line gives off.

Much of Bendigo is set to get REFCLs by 2021 and the technology has already been rolled out to areas including Eaglehawk, Maryborough, Castlemaine and Gisborne.

This months' tests are about demonstrating the technology meets the requirements of legislation brought in after Black Saturday, Powercor REFCL technical director Andrew Bailey said.

It also validates earlier research into technology that was originally developed to make Europe's underground cable network more reliable, not overhead lines in areas of high bushfire risk, he said.

"By the end of last year we had done over 1700 primary fault tests like this around the state," Mr Bailey said.

"It gives us even more confidence that this technology is operating as we hoped it would."

"We've learnt about the maximum size of networks that each REFCL can see. Some need one, some need two.

"We are talking about measuring very small quantities that previously might have been seen as white noise. So we need very sensitive and accurate equipment and I think we have improved our understanding of how we measure that.

"You want the thing to work when its supposed to. You don't want it to mistakenly go off all the time."

Last summer saw 14 total fire ban days, nine "transient" faults and three permanent faults across western Victoria, Mr Bailey said.

"You can't say each of those permanent faults were a fire avoided, but the technology is doing what it's supposed to do and reacting on those days," he said.

"If it's a permanent fault REFCL is shutting the power off to avoid that chance a fire may start."

This year's fire season will likely coincide with drier conditions, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

Reduced chances of cyclones in Australia's north will likely come as more "extreme heat" masses in the centre of the continent, the BOM predicted in a severe weather outlook on Monday.

"This raises the risk of heatwaves for much of southern and eastern Victoria, when winds push this heat towards the coast," meteorologist Adam Morgan said.

Eastern Victoria will likely have an above average fire potential, while central and western Victoria's will be normal, the BOM has forecast.

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