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ENERGIX-Stort program energi

Advanced System protection schemes Applied in the Power grid

Alternative title: Forbedret systemvern for fremtidens kraftsystem

Awarded: NOK 5.8 mill.

The project Advanced System Protection Schemes Applied in the Power grid (ASAP) is an industry innovation project led by Statnett, partially funded by the Norwegian Research Council, and the project consortium consists of partners: DNV, NTNU, RISE, and Energyield. The project ASAP is intended to build the foundation and key building blocks for the long-term goal of enabling fully automatically activated and deactivated System Protection Schemes to provide the highest possible reliability and capacity utilization of the Norwegian power grid. Today event-based protection solutions are currently used extensively in the Norwegian power system. These protection solutions, System Protection Schemes (SPS), are important contributors to maximize the degree of secure utilization and they are an important enabler for an increasing share of renewables in the system. SPSs are specially designed to solve specific network challenges and intervene in the grid by taking appropriate protective actions, such as disconnection or curtailment of production or consumers. There are now more than 350 SPS functions in the Norwegian power system and all settings are performed manually by operators at Statnett's control centres. SPS is a powerful and complex tool, however, without a good overview and correct settings, it could risk making unwanted interventions with major consequences and destabilizing effects on the whole power system. The control centres and planning departments that handle the complexity of SPS, have warned that it is not justifiable to expand the use with the current methods. To ensure SPS can maintain its role as a critical contributor in the future power system with the increasing electrification of Norway, Statnett is initiating the ASAP project which will design the next generation of system protection through the development of new methods for risk control, optimization and automation, and an improved intelligent interface with the control centres' operators.

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The primary objective of ASAP (Advanced System protection schemes Applied in the Power grid) is to build the foundation for Statnett´s long term goal of an automatically activated and deactivated System Protection Scheme (SPS). A SPS that is automatically activated and deactivated based on the operating situation, is expected to provide highest reliability and utilization of the power grid. The ASAP project will develop and prototype a user interface and its related interaction model; develop a method that automates and optimizes the SPS, regarding activation status and activation volume, considering the given operating situation; develop a method that reveals any dependency between the SPSs and investigate automatic solutions to optimize utilization of available transmission grid capacity. There are several research challenges that the project will face which require different approaches. * The development of user interfaces and effective communication of SPS require close dialog with the operators and the scientific method must reflect that this is an iterative process where the cognitive element is important. * The development of the optimized SPS must be based on the theoretical methods and models developed for power system optimization and control. The scientific method will be a combination of applying optimization theory and validation through numerical simulations. * Another challenge is how to use available measurements and to detect disturbances in real-time in order to obtain precise information about the state of the system. Reliable state estimation is a requirement for coordinated control actions.

Funding scheme:

ENERGIX-Stort program energi