Searching for small-world and scale-free behaviour in long-term historical data of a real-world power grid
by Bálint Hartmann
at 11.30 - 12.00
Since the introduction of small-world and scale-free properties, there is ongoing discussion on how certain real-world networks fit into these network science concepts. While the electrical power grid was among the most discussed example of these real-word networks, published results are controversial and usually missed to take the aspects of network evolution into consideration. As a result of this, there is a broad agreement that power grids are small-world networks and might show scale-free behaviour, although very little attempts were made to find how these characteristics of the network are related to grid infrastructure development or other underlying phenomena. In this paper the authors use the 70-year historical dataset of the Hungarian power grid to perform network analysis, which is the first attempt to evaluate small-world and scale-free properties on long-term real-world data. Results of the analysis suggest that power grids show small-world behaviour only after the introduction of multiple voltage levels. It is also demonstrated that the node distribution of the examined power grid does not show scale-free behaviour and that the scaling is stabilised around certain values after the initial phase of grid evolution.
Further Notes:
Bio: Bálint Hartmann, Dr. was born in 1984. He received an M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering and obtained his Ph.D. degree from Budapest University of Technology and Economics in 2008 and 2013, respectively. He is associate professor at the Department of Electric Power Engineering, Budapest University of Technology and Economics. He is also a part-time research fellow with the Centre for Energy Research. His fields of interest include the role of energy storage in the power system, computer modelling and simulation of distribution networks and integration of variable renewable energy sources.
B. Hartmann, V. Sugár: Searching for small-world and scale-free behaviour in long-term historical data of a real-world power grid https://arxiv.org/abs/2010.09315