Equipment aging has been a major concern among electric utilities’ planners, since quality of service can be put at risk. This paper proposes a new method that allows the effects of the aging of generators to be properly included into the reliability analysis of power systems. First, a new model for the failure rate capable of representing the stages of normal operation and wear-out, replacing the adoption of constant failure rates, is described. The effects of repairable and non-repairable (i.e., catastrophic) failures on the reliability assessment of generation systems are also discussed. The proposed method is built from the previous models using a sequential Monte Carlo simulation and variance reduction techniques. To validate the proposed method, the IEEE Reliability Test System is used with modifications in which different ages are defined for existing generating units that are progressively aging over the years. Several tests are described together with strategies for adopting preventive refurbishments and the corresponding results are duly discussed.

设备老化一直是电力公司规划人员的主要担忧，因为服务质量可能会受到威胁。本文提出了一种新方法，可以将发电机老化的影响适当地纳入电力系统的可靠性分析中。首先，描述了一种新的故障率模型，能够代表正常运行和磨损阶段，取代采用恒定故障率。还讨论了可修复和不可修复（即灾难性）故障对发电系统可靠性评估的影响。所提出的方法是使用顺序蒙特卡罗模拟和方差减少技术从以前的模型构建的。为了验证所提出的方法，IEEE 可靠性测试系统经过修改后使用，其中为多年来逐渐老化的现有发电机组定义了不同的年龄。描述了几种测试以及采用预防性翻新的策略，并适当讨论了相应的结果。