Critical Infrastructure Protection and the Private Sector : The Crucial Role of Incentives

The blackout of 2003 has underscored concerns about the vulnerability of our nation’s critical infrastructure to both accidents and deliberate attack, providing an immediate connection to the nation’s homeland security efforts. But the blackout may offer a deeper lesson beyond the vulnerability of the nation’s electricity grid to terrorist attack. In particular, a common explanation for the problems facing the electricity system is that private firms have had inadequate incentives to invest in distribution lines.