Ekaterina Smorodkina and Dr. Daniel Tauritz Department of Computer Science Power Grid Protection through Rapid Response Control of FACTS Devices

Motivation Major blackouts in Italy and North America Rapid response may prevent blackouts FACTS: Flexible AC Transmission System FACTS devices allow rapid response FACTS placement & control is complex

Outline Impact Analysis of FACTS devices Rapid response to contingencies Power Flow control algorithm Introducing Partial Power Flow Results & Analysis Future applications of Partial Power Flow

Impact Analysis (1)

Impact Analysis (2)

Rapid Response Optimization objective: minimize performance metric Control algorithm To evaluate metric, power flow must be computed Gradient descent method – a sequence of solutions U 1, U 2, … U M Power flow must be recomputed multiple times to optimize control

Partial Power Flow (PPF) Use result of impact analysis that not all lines are effected How do we know which lines will be effected? Recall the sequence of solutions: U 1, U 2, … U M Idea: lines effected by solution U k will also be effected by solution U k+1

Results

Summary Preventing blackouts is essential Significant part of the grid can be influenced with few FACTS devices The Partial Power Flow Algorithm speeds up control of FACTS devices

Future Applications of PPF Other algorithms that re-compute power flow multiple times Multi-agent control of power systems Each agent controls a part of the grid Power flow must be computed locally