Seismic Analysis of Power Systems Performance:

Project Abstract

for the 2006 Complex Systems Summer School July 10- August 4, 2006, Beijing, China

SEISMIC ANALYSIS OF POWER SYSTEMS PERFORMANCE

by

WU Zhigang

Electric Power College, the South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China

CHANG Liang

Deptartment of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA

SHI Shanshan

Dept. of Electrical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

Abstract: Civil infrastructure systems, including power systems, water delivery systems and communication systems, etc. are the essential urban elements and are also highly vulnerable to natural and man-made disasters such as earthquakes and terrorist attacks. Power system is especially crucial to emergency response, recovery, and post-disaster reconstruction. Damaged power systems could result in severe socio-economic consequences. Using the data from the power utilities including 2706 buses and more than 3400 branches, we studied the system reliability and the performance of the power system under both a given scenario earthquake and a hypothetical terrorist attack. The seismic reliability of the substations (nodes) was evaluated under the impact of earthquake. Power flow (load flow) analysis was conducted on the hypothetical power network. The most vulnerable (critical) edges and nodes were evaluated with complex network theory. These results can be used to estimate cascading failure and direct and indirect economic loss induced by the damaged power system. The results could also be useful for local planning department and power industries to evaluate the most vulnerable nodes/edges of the power system and improve their seismic performance under economic constrains