Modeling and Analysis of Renewable-Rich Power Grids: Navigating IBR Challenges

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This webinar highlights the emerging challenges in modeling and analyzing the electric power system due to the widespread growth of variable renewable energy (VRE), particularly in the form of distributed energy resources (DERs) that are displacing traditional large power plants. Understanding the dynamic behavior of the power system should be critical to addressing the potential stability concerns, refining the grid requirements, and developing effective and reliable measures, among many alternatives. However, conventional methodologies for resource integration and network expansion studies, as well as application-specific electromagnetic transient (EMT) studies, need improvements. This talk thus presents recent academic and industrial efforts to advance the existing approaches, especially by incorporating the variability of VRE, and EMT dynamics of IBRs, focusing on Jeju island and Honam province power grids of Korea.

Jeju Special Self-Governing Province of South Korea declared its vision to become an island with net zero emissions by 2030, initiating a project dubbed “Carbon Free Island Jeju 2030”, or CFI 2030. This talk investigates the challenges of grid operation with high levels of inverter-based resources (IBR) and demonstrates how the grid forming technologies help the Jeju power grid operate with 100% generation from IBR, i.e., without any synchronous generation, and achieve carbon neutrality. It is interesting to note that the Jeju power grid is connected to the mainland power grid (Honam province) through two HVDC lines, two line commutated converter types (heavily depending on the grid strength), and one VSC type (to be commissioned in early 2025). More than 40% of renewables have been deployed in the Honam area, which makes the grid weaker and more vulnerable to various operational concerns. This webinar selects some crucial concerns raised in grid operations, discusses lessons learned through comprehensive studies, and proposes ways to handle them.