Application of Topological Network Measures to Identify Critical Gas Transmission Network Components

This study introduces three generalized component importance measures for identifying criticalcomponents of heterogeneous substrate infrastructure networks. The proposed metrics areapplied to a realistic European gas transmission network and different sets of critical componentsare obtained. The criticality of gas supply and the resilience of demand nodes are also analyzedbased on the multiple sources and sinks maximum flow problem. The weakness of the networkstructure under some particular supply disruption scenarios is highlighted. These results of thistype of analysis can be of great use in supporting network design and operation, e.g., for decidingwhich components should be protected and/or upgraded under a limited budget