C1400 — Disaster management and resilience in electric power systems

Descripción

Electricity infrastructure is key to sustain human and economic well-being since it supplies energy to industrial, commercial and financial sectors, critical services (health, traffic control, water supply), communication networks, and hence almost all activities in modern societies. Consequently, the effects of long electricity blackouts have demonstrated impacts on economic activities and social stability and security. A framework for disaster management and resilience of the power sector is needed, beyond the occurrence of "average" outages contemplated in current security standards. This framework should consider network management under the occurrence of natural hazards such as earthquakes and tsunamis that may cause major blackouts, and assess proper measures to manage the associated disasters. Developing and implementing such a framework will be crucial to increase the opportunities for developing and low-income countries. In this context, this project will undertake holistic risk analyses associated with natural hazards on electricity networks along with identification of mitigation and adaptation measures that can allow us to manage the arising disasters. This holistic perspective of disaster management and resilience will be supported by mathematical models to assess risks related to high impact low probability events, such as earthquakes and tsunamis, on the electric power systems. These models will serve to identify an optimal portfolio of preventive and corrective measures that can support mitigation of impacts and compare different adaptation strategies. In particular, besides classical infrastructure reinforcement, we will assess how operational measures can provide system resilience.