Effects of Prolonged Electricity Supply Disruptions on Critical Entities

Abstract: This study investigates Swedish critical entities (CEs) ability to maintain function during up to three months of electricity supply disruptions. It also examines possible improvement measures, and how contextual cases (grey zone, heightened state of alert, war) influence CEs’ ability to maintain function during electricity supply disruptions. Expert elicitation was conducted with experts from eight CEs. The methodological approach provides an easily comparable base measure of critical flow disruption effects on CEs, which can be used for further analyses (e.g. quantifying societal consequences). From the analysis it is concluded that CEs are more vulnerable to outage length (hours/day) than duration (consecutive days with certain outage length). The ability for CEs to maintain function varies significantly and uncertainty of estimates increases with duration. CE function is generally worsened by contextual cases. Many identified improvement measures are CE-specific, but generic categories include improved supply solutions, joint coordination with interdependent actors, and alternatives to diesel auxiliary power. Adequately assigned deployment duties are essential during states of heightened alert and war. It might be timely to capture potential synergies with ongoing expansion of distributed electricity sources (e.g. solar, city-level battery storage facilities). It is concluded that improvement measures should be based on analysis of individual CEs ability to cope with prolonged electricity outages.