High Reliability Management: Operating on the Edge

This book presents a multi-year case study of the California Independent System Operator (CAISO), the government entity created to operate California's electricity grid when the state deregulated its electricity market. CAISO's travails read like The Perils of Pauline and the authors do an outstanding job of describing the different grid management strategies CAISO used under various operating conditions. It is a comprehensive description of contingency management in the real world, emphasizing CAISO's adaptability to new and changing environmental demands, requirements and constraints.The primary analytic device is the authors' High Reliability Management model, a 2x2 matrix where the axes are System Volatility and Network Options Variety. System Volatility refers to the magnitude and rate of change of CAISO's environmental variables; Network Options Variety refers to the range of resources and strategies available for meeting demand (basically in real time) given the current inputs. Each variable can be High or Low so there are four possible modes and a distinctive operating management approach for each. All modes must accomplish CAISO's two missions of matching electricity supply and demand, and protecting the grid. The key dynamic for the CAISO organization is the need to recognize mode shifts and switch management strategies accordingly as the manifestation of “normal” operations.High Reliability Management describes something rare, a socio-technical-political start-up entity. It's well-written and full of insightful observations.

Informative Text.