title: Does size matter?
abstract: Failures of the complex infrastructures society depends on having enormous human and economic cost that poses the question: Are there ways to optimize these systems to reduce the risks of failure? A dynamic model of one such system, the power transmission grid, is used to investigate the risk from failure as a function of the system size. It is found that there appears to be optimal sizes for such networks where the risk of failure is balanced by the benefit given by the size.
authors.affiliation: BACV Solutions, 110 Mohawk Road, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37830, USA.
authors.forename: B A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Carreras
authors.affiliation: Physics Department, College of Natural Science and Mathematics and Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, Alaska 99775, USA.
authors.forename: D E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Newman
authors.affiliation: ECpE Department, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa 50011, USA.
authors.forename: Ian
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Dobson