Developing a framework to enhance the seismic resilience of the electricity distribution system feeding the healthcare system

Abstract

Delivering electricity to hospitals is vital for maintaining hospitals' functionality. Given the seismic vulnerability of electrical substations, providing effective rehabilitation plans for repairing these systems seems necessary for a resilient healthcare system. Studies concerning interdependent systems' functionality have not thoroughly addressed the interdependency of healthcare and electrical distribution systems. A framework to identify the effectiveness of different post-disaster rehabilitation plans for electrical substations to enhance the resilience of the healthcare system electricity is developed in this study, which increases the recoverability of the healthcare system after an earthquake. The vulnerability analysis for electrical facilities is done using modified fragility functions, considering the effects of aging as well. The geographical information system is used for assigning patients to hospitals given several patients' decision criteria. The framework uses a stochastic discrete event simulation to determine the effectiveness of different rehabilitation scenarios for five days after an earthquake occurs while using patients’ waiting time as the performance measure. Finally, the proposed framework is applied to Ghazvin city in the north-west of Iran. The results show that the best scenario would increase system resilience by 85%, highlighting the importance of identifying and implementing the best scenario.