Dynamic phasors for simulation of large electrical power systems

Abstract

Over the last years there has been a growing concern over the impact of a large number of Converter-Interfaced Generation (CIG) connected to the grid, which leads to a lower overall inertia. But even more concerning are the controls of converters that interact with the rest of the grid, making it weaker in ways that are not fully understood. Recent events of grid incidents or even large-scale blackouts have raised the alarm over the stability of the grid. In particular, these events have sparked the speculation that one of the determining factors may be in the inverter controls, which interact with the grid dynamics in a currently unpredictable manner. Amid these circumstances, the need for reliable, real-time simulations for planning in advance has emerged, with the dynamic phasor method standing out as a promise for making such sim- ulations possible. In this work, a simulation environment using dynamic phasors is developed in MATLAB. Models of two power-generating electrical devices - a Voltage Source Converter (VSC) and a synchronous generator - are derived and integrated in the network model. The dynamic phasor simulations are evaluated under various use cases, and results are compared with more conventional simulation methods also developed within the program.