In the context of maintaining energy security and implementing low-carbon development, ensuring the power system reliability is becoming increasingly challenging. The interdependence between power industry and other sectors within the supply chain network exposes the entire economy to unpredictable higher-order economic impact resulting from power interruption. To explore the heterogeneous regional effects by improving power supply reliability in mitigating national economic losses, this study employs an agent-based complex network supply chain model to conduct an economic assessment of power supply reliability in China. Using a top-down approach, the study estimates the direct economic losses of production activities due to power interruption in China in 2018 and incorporates them as external shocks in the complex network model to simulate the higherorder indirect economic losses caused by power disruption in the supply chain network on a daily basis. By setting up 298 scenarios that reduce power outage duration in each region one by one, the study identifies 15 key regions for safeguarding power supply reliability. Enhancing the power supply reliability in these areas can result in an average reduction of indirect economic losses ranging from CNY 439 million to CNY 1.96 billion nationwide, representing a decrease of 0.39% to 1.76% compared to the baseline scenario. The findings of this research may provide guidance for relevant departments in identifying priority areas, assessing the value of power supply reliability, considering additional costs for power security maintenance, and formulating policy implications for the development of power security construction in different regions.

power outage  /  reliability of power supply  /  agent-based model  /  complex network