The Electric Graph
Inevitably, as the temperatures rise through the summer months, the usage of A/C and fans will increase therefore also increasing the amount of power draw on the power grid. California has one of the largest infrastructures for the generation and distribution of power amongst its 39.9 million current residents. Currently, California is experiencing blackouts to the extent of whole cities losing power for up to 3 hours. The stress on the power grid is due to a number of factors, but mainly due to power lines being compromised to the wildfires running rampant in the summer heat. When you have a large network of nodes such as the California power grid, losing an edge, the power line, won’t cause the system to fail because power can be routed through a longer, less efficient route.
Rerouting the grid can be a difficult and costly process. The power grid is designed to have enough slack or unused capacity to handle sudden increases in demand, but when demand exceeds supply for long periods of time, brownouts can occur. Brownouts are a temporary reduction in voltage that can cause lights to dim and appliances to run less efficiently. In extreme cases, brownouts can cause equipment damage. The blackouts are a result of something called a “cascading failure.” This is when the loss of a small number of nodes results in a larger number of nodes being lost. The blackouts are caused by the loss of power lines to the wildfires. The loss of these power lines causes a loss of power to the substations that they are connected to. The loss of power to these substations causes a loss of power to the areas that they service. This can cause a domino effect where the loss of a few power lines can result in a large number of people losing power. Looking at this as a system of nodes on a connected network graph, we can compare it to the traffic analogy where as more people travel along one road the time to get through that road increases.
Source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/california-faces-threat-of-rolling-blackouts-as-heat-wave-persists-11662473810