Societal Vulnerability to Electricity Supply Failure

Abstract

Today’s modern society depends on a number of infrastructures to operate. Failures in these systems cause significant economic impacts and can also endanger the lives and health of the population. The high importance of these infrastructures has led them to increasing attention in recent years and are referred to as critical infrastructure. Critical infrastructure in the energy sector is considered to be one of the most important infrastructure networks significantly entering into ensuring the functional continuity of the society. Its importance is also perceived in terms of interconnections and correlations with other critical infrastructure sectors as well as in terms of electricity interconnectivity in Europe, as in the interconnected European system the effects are spreading across systems of all single country transmission system operators very quickly. For these reasons, the European Union considers this sector to be strategic and of European importance. The aim of the article is to clarify the primary causes of disruption of large-scale electricity supply and their impact on the functioning of society, focusing on the vulnerability of urbanized large settlements urban agglomerations in the event of long-lasting blackout disturbances. It contains a presentation of the importance of electricity for society, definition and analysis of the causes of disruption of large-scale electricity supply continuity, consequences of large-scale blackout on community functioning and its basic functions and current knowledge on vulnerability of large urban agglomerations to long-term disruption of electricity supply and possible solutions.