Use of Sensitivity Analysis in Automated Transmission Planning

The expansion of the transmission network can be viewed as a sequence of network reinforcements throughout the planning period. At a given time (stage) in the future, several circuits will be overloaded or very close to being overloaded. These circuits can be identified by solving the power flow equations for the conditions prevailing at that future time and under all postulated outages. Given the circuits which need reinforcement, the problem is to find the rights-of-way on which construction of new circuits will alleviate the undesirable loading of the circuits in a cost effective way.