A Markov-Based Cascading Outage Searching Method Considering Load-Dependent Outages

A cascading outage, which consists of a series of successive outages caused by certain and uncertain factors, such as weather, disoperation or incorrect operation of the system equipment, is a severe threat to the modern electric power system. Several probabilistic models have been proposed to analyze the propagation and probability distribution of a cascading outage. However, the influence of the operational conditions and outage sequences on the cascading outage probability and consequences have been neglected. In this paper, a Markov-based method is proposed to simulate a cascading outage. The component load-dependent outage rate is studied, the outage sequences are analyzed, and a practical way to estimate the transition probability is proposed. The IEEE Reliability Test System is used to validate the model and demonstrate the results.