Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Large-scale disasters have exposed vulnerabilities in energy systems and interdependent infrastructure, underscoring the importance of proactively mitigating risks to critical infrastructure. This paper focuses on strengthening power system planning by incorporating the costs associated with prolonged and extensive power interruptions to bolster resilience. To achieve this, duration-dependent customer damage functions are developed, capturing the direct, indirect, and societal impacts of power interruptions, ranging from short, localized events to widespread and long-duration ones. The research methodology is applied to three islanded communities facing substantial resilience challenges with limited data availability. Three customer interruption cost surveys are conducted with local electricity customers, yielding valuable insights into duration-dependent customer damage functions for direct, indirect, and monetizable societal costs. Significantly, the power interruption cost estimates derived from these functions vary considerably from those in the contiguous U.S. and even between the different islanded communities, reflecting their distinct hazard profiles and geographical characteristics. In conclusion, this study demonstrates the potential of duration-dependent customer damage functions to enhance power system resilience. It also identifies several areas for further research, paving the way for a more robust and resilient power infrastructure.