Analysis and control of major blackout events

This is a summary for presentation in the panel session, “Understanding, Prediction, Mitigation and Restoration of Cascading Failures” at IEEE PES PSCE 2009. Recent major blackouts in North America, Europe, and other countries highlight the importance of reliability of our electric energy infrastructure and the economic impact of blackouts. These blackouts were caused by a cascading sequence of events including line tripping, overloading of other lines, malfunctions of protection devices, power oscillations and voltage instability, and system splitting and collapse. In this presentation, common characteristics of blackouts are clarified by analyzing the cascaded events of the major blackouts. Appropriate control actions to alleviate emergency conditions including overloads are vital to prevent cascaded events. On the basis of the common characteristics of blackouts, the panelist will discuss available control actions for overloads through system operation and emergency control. The future research needs for mitigating cascaded events will be discussed.