Reliability and quality of supply for the grid of the future understanding the economics

Finding solutions to improve the performance of the electric infrastructure must be considered in combination with the requirements and designs of end use equipment and processes. The Consortium for the Electric Infrastructure to support a Digital Society (CEIDS) is investigating improved methods to achieve compatibility between the electric infrastructure quality and reliability and the design of end use technologies and processes. This compatibility will be achieved not only by development of new, advanced technologies to improve performance of the supply system; but also by identifying market and regulatory structures that can facilitate flexible and tailored quality and reliability levels as a function of system, customer types, and contractual arrangements. This paper focuses on characterizing the economics of power quality and reliability issues at different levels of the system. The ultimate objective is to determine the optimum approaches for investment that consider costs at all levels of the system, from the supply system infrastructure to the individual end use equipment that is affected by power quality and reliability problems. An approach for this problem is presented.