Modeling and Assessing the Impact of Flash Floods on a Power Distribution System

Power system is considered a lifeline of the modern community because the functionality of critical infrastructures such as transportation networks, banking systems, and emergency health facilities rely on the supply of electrical energy. Although the power system is appreciably reliable, severe weather events such as hurricanes and floods have caused large-scale power outages. These widespread power cuts not only result in a significant monetary loss but also create socio-economic and security problems. Therefore, utility operators must have an earlier preparation for these extreme weather events to reduce damage to power system assets such as electrical substations and to restore electricity supply as quickly as possible. In this respect, a probabilistic model to forecast rainfall intensity is proposed in this paper. Further to this, the Monte Carlo technique is employed to predict flood-induced failures in power distribution systems. Finally, the impact of these failures on system performance is evaluated to plan a resilient network restoration strategy following a flood event. The proposed methodology is tested on the IEEE 33-bus system and provides a solid foundation for the efficient allocation of resources and effective deployment of repair crews to enhance power distribution system resilience for flash flooding.