On-Line Analysis of the Electrical System Security: an Extensive Simulation Approach in a Dynamic Security Assessment (DSA) Environment

The growing complexity of the electrical systems, the energy sector restructuring and liberalization, the innovation in the field of power generation, transmission and distribution, make the power systems operation more complex year by year. In order to maintain adequacy, security and quality levels, the new situation requires to know, more accurately and quickly than in the past, the state of the electrical system, in order to precisely and timely identify critical contingencies, as well as to dispose as soon as possible the power network protection in case of system faults or restoration in case of black-outs.
A possible solution, whose adoption is progressively growing among TSOs worldwide, does consist in the design of on-line special analysis tools, which help control room operators to manage the power system in the respect of static and dynamic security criteria, and suggest, if necessary, the most suitable remedial actions to be execute in order to prevent or correct dangerous conditions. The integration between modern measurement systems, controls and protections allows the TSO operators to increase their general awareness about the power system security, as well as to clearly display systems data and to evaluate from grid snapshots the system behaviour following contingencies. By mean of automated elaboration systems it is therefore possible to develop very sophisticated Static Security Assessment (SSA), Dynamic Security Assessment (DSA) and to identify Optimal Power Flow (OPF) and Optimal Reactive Power Flow (ORPF), until to adopt Special Protection Systems (SPS) and Wide Area Measurement/Control/Protection Systems (WAMS/WACS/WAPS).
The aim of this paper is to show the main features of the new Dynamic Security Assessment (DSA) platform, developed for Terna by CESI, whose experimentation is on-going at the Italian National Control Centre of Rome. The paper introduces the main architecture, characteristics and features of the DSA environment and its relationship with static and dynamic simulation engines . ​​​​