We have enjoyed very high reliability in our power system for many decades primarily through synchronous generation (SG). Now with more and more inverter-based resources (IBR’s) replacing the SG we are entering an area of numerous unknowns. IBR’s have been basically designed to go offline during a stressed event on the grid. We have seen numerous instances of this in the last several years. IBR’s are dynamic devices and must be modeled and analyzed with EMT type software such as PSCAD which we have been doing for some time. Now we are beginning to understand that we must add other components of the system such as protective relays on the grid to see how the entire system responds. I have read many articles stating that under stressed conditions to just remove the IBR. This is not nor certainly will not be acceptable moving forward if we want to continue to enjoy the level of reliability that we have enjoyed for many decades. We must model and analyze the system as a whole to better understand how the system responds so that we may continue to enjoy the stable reliable energy supply system. Please feel free to reach out to me to discuss this further.
Ahmed Elnaggar
3mo
I do agree 100%, any network with IBR should be analyzed in the EMT domain and all the protection devices and their operation should be also considered to understand exactly the system stability under several events.
HVDC Engineering Expertise
3moA few countries have gone to wide area models using PSCAD for this purpose of IBRs. This becomes a significant problem at about 60% renewable penetration. We have just received another request from a country to do the same. We are the developer, marketer, and we also use PSCAD for our Clients. It started by helping a system operator when they had new interconnections of wind or solar go wrong, solution PSCAD study. Then they said what if they require a PSCAD study BEFORE the Contractor is allowed to connect. Of course we said YES