Abstract:The rapid incorporation of wind power resources in electrical power networks has significantly increased the volatility of transmission systems due to the inherent uncertainty associated with wind power. This paper addresses this issue by proposing a transmission network expansion planning (TEP) model that integrates wind power resources, and that seeks to minimize the sum of investment costs and operation costs while accounting for the costs associated with the pollution emissions of generator infrastructure. Auxiliary relaxation variables are introduced to transform the established model into a mixed integer linear programming problem. Furthermore, the novel concept of extreme wind power scenarios is defined, theoretically justified, and then employed to establish a two-stage robust TEP method. The decision-making variables of prospective transmission lines are determined in the first stage, so as to ensure that the operating variables in the second stage can adapt to wind power fluctuations. A Benders' decomposition algorithm is developed to solve the proposed two-stage model. Finally, extensive numerical studies are conducted with Garver's 6-bus system, a modified IEEE RTS79 system and IEEE 118-bus system, and the computational results demonstrate the effectiveness and practicability of the proposed method.