A customer value-added reliability approach to transmission system reinforcement planning

As customers increasingly demand lower rates and higher reliability in the new competitive market, the challenging task of any electric utility is to minimize the capital investments and operation and maintenance expenditures to hold down electricity rates. If however, the cost is cut too far, it may jeopardize the system´s ability to supply reliable power to its customers. The movement towards deregulation will therefore introduce a wide range of reliability issues that will require system reliability criteria and models that can incorporate the residual risks and uncertainties associated with transmission system planning and operating. Customer responsive value-based reliability techniques offer a rational response to emerging conflicting new requirements. This paper presents a customer value-added transmission system expansion and investment technique developed to satisfy ever-increasing customer demands of lower rates and higher service reliability in the competitive market. The developed technique has been applied to a real transmission network reinforcement problem of the Alberta Interconnected System.