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CREATE Electricity Case Main Report: Risk, Consequences, and Economic Accounting, Report 1

Author: Rae Zimmerman, Carlos E. Restrepo, Nicole Dooskin, Ray Hartwell, Justin Miller, Wendy Remington, Jeffrey S. Simonoff, Lester B. Lave, and Richard E. Schuler

Sector: Energy

Publication type: Acrobat PDF

As a critical infrastructure sector, electricity enables numerous other critical infrastructures to function, and in many cases is the critical path for their operation. This is underscored by the fact that historically, electric power outages have played a central role in disruptions of many other infrastructures. As a consequence of the centrality of its role, electricity is potentially a key target for terrorist attacks. This case sets forth risks in terms of hypothetical alternative attack scenarios in the form of various grid configurations that are vulnerable based on both natural events in the U.S. and terrorism internationally as well as in terms of the odds that outages will occur and other characteristics of outages will change. Consequences are then identified based on hundreds of events and other records that portray the effects that electric power outages have on key public services and businesses. Economic accounting is conducted in terms of human premature death and injury and business loss for some of the key consequence areas, using a wide range of economic factors. The work presented in this report is complemented by the work of other team members. In the risk area, Bier’s study at the University of Wisconsin portrays the effect on the capacity of hypothetical grids to carry and redistribute electricity under alternative interdiction scenarios. For consequences, the work of Chen at USC identifies electric power system performance following a catastrophic event. As consequences and economic accounting, Greenberg, Laer, and Mantell, part of the NYU team, are conducting a model of effect of electricity outage on the economy of New Jersey, the densest and wealthiest state in the U.S. Current Reports in the Electricity Case series (the Main Report should be used in conjunction with these other reports): Electricity Case: Main Report – Risk, Consequences, and Economic Accounting – Report 1 Electricity Case: Economic Cost Estimation Factors for Economic Assessment of Terrorist Attacks – Report 2 Electricity Case: Statistical Analysis of Electric Power Outages – Report 3 Risk Analysis of Infrastructure Systems – Different Approaches for Risk Analysis of Electric Power Systems – Report 4 Economic Impacts of an Attack on Electric Power in the State of New Jersey

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Date Created: May 2005; Date Posted: September 2006

People:

• Dooskin, Nicole
• Hartwell, Ray
• Lave, Lester
• Miller, Justin
• Remington, Wendy
• Restrepo, Carlos
• Schuler, Richard
• Simonoff, Jeffrey
• Zimmerman, Rae

Projects:

• Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE)

Sectors:

• Energy

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