Value based reliability investment in a modern power system

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Reliability assessment plays a major role in planning generating capacity and transmission network in order to arrive at optimum investment decisions. The reliability and economics of alternative planning options often compete with each other, and the investment cost required to achieve a certain level of reliability should be justified by the benefits derived by society with the improved reliability. Electric power utilities routinely apply established reliability criteria to determine appropriate capacity expansion projects. A reliability level approved as the planning criterion for an electric utility is perceived to provide an acceptable balance between reliability and economics. Many utilities use a loss of load expectation (LOLE) of 0.1 days per year as their reliability criteria in generation planning. Other utilities, including SaskPower, utilize generation planning criteria in other forms. It may be unrealistic to assume that one criterion, such as the LOLE of 0.1 days per year, fits all power systems that are inherently different. A comprehensive reliability cost and reliability worth evaluation is required to determine the most suitable criterion for a given power system. The researcher proposes to work jointly with SaskPower to determine the investment costs associated with generation expansion plans and the reliability worth of the projected expansion plans using customer surveys. Customer surveys are costly, time consuming and not favorably received by the public, but have been sporadically conducted in different parts of the world. A reliability criterion determined during a period of time may no longer be valid after a few years since power systems are rapidly changing in physical, operational and market structures which are mainly driven by de-regulation, renewable energy growth, emerging micro-grids and smart-grid initiatives. The proposed research will also develop a methodology based on fundamental principles of power system reliability and economics to estimate appropriate reliability criterion without having to carryout frequent customer surveys. These methods will be further extended to provide tools to conduct value based reliability evaluation that will provide valuable input in deciding investment in new system components and technologies.