Emergent failures and cascades in power grids: a statistical physics perspective
Physics and Society
2018-06-27 v3 Disordered Systems and Neural Networks
Systems and Control
Probability
Abstract
We model power grids transporting electricity generated by intermittent renewable sources as complex networks, where line failures can emerge indirectly by noisy power input at the nodes. By combining concepts from statistical physics and the physics of power flows, and taking weather correlations into account, we rank line failures according to their likelihood and establish the most likely way such failures occur and propagate. Our insights are mathematically rigorous in a small-noise limit and are validated with data from the German transmission grid.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1709.10166,
title = {Emergent failures and cascades in power grids: a statistical physics perspective},
author = {Tommaso Nesti and Alessandro Zocca and Bert Zwart},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1709.10166},
year = {2018}
}
Comments
18 pages (6 pages + 12 pages with supplemental material). Accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters