The value of supply security: The costs of power outages to Austrian households, firms and the public sector

This paper presents a model for assessing economic losses caused by electricity cuts as well as Willingness-to-Pay to avoid these power outages as an approximation to the value of supply security. The economic effects for simulated power cuts from 1 to 48h, which take the affected provinces, the day of the week and the time of day into consideration, can be calculated using the assessment tool APOSTEL. The costs due to power cuts are computed separately for all sectors of the economy and for households. The average value of lost load for Austrian households and non-household consumers in the case of a power cut of 1h on a summer workday morning was calculated to be 17.1€ per kWh of electricity not supplied.