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CALGARY 2009

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Power regulation resources required by wind power in Finland and regulation

characteristics of power plants
MSc Mikko Holmgren, F-Consult Ltd, Finland
Professor (DrSc) Liisa Haarla, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
Specialist (MSc) Jussi Matilainen, Fingrid Oyj, Finland
Senior research scientist (DrSc) Hannele Holttinen, Technical Research Centre of Finland

SUMMARY
This paper presents different technical possibilities to balance the short term production and
consumption of electricity in Finland. Based on several wind measurements in Finland, the amount of
wind power variation was calculated for a scenario with 2000 MW wind power in Finland.
Additionally, an estimate of the reserves needed for wind power and an analysis of the regulating
power market (balancing market) in Finland was made.
Hydro power and gas turbines can be regulated by at least 40 % of the maximum capacity in one
minute. Condensing power plants fuelled by coal (or peat) can be regulated by 5 % (or 3 %) of their
capacity in one minute. The power regulation characteristics in Combined Heat and Power plants
(CHP) vary from one plant to another. Therefore no general figures can be given. However, CHP can
have possibility for high regulation capacity if heat storage are provided. The one minute power
regulation for pressurized water nuclear reactors can be from 1 to 3 % of the capacity. Based on these
figures and on the installed Finnish electricity production capacity, there is 2100-2200 MW (hydro
power and gas turbines) of power reserve capacity in Finland.
The maximum power variation in wind power production from hour to hour has been 16 % and the
corresponding standard deviation is 2.7 % of the installed capacity, from three years of measured
power production data in Finland. Based on these measurements a scenario with 2000 MW wind
power in Finland was made. In this scenario the maximum hourly production variation would be 20 %
and the standard deviation 3.4 %.
This study also examines the changes in Finlands regulating power market in aggregated regulation
bids, volume of regulating power and regulating power price. Both regulation bids and volume of
regulating power vary in time. In recent years there have been an increased number of peaks in the
regulating power price.
If the wind power capacity (2000 MW) would be geographically distributed, it would unlikely have an
impact on the amount of the disturbance reserves. The influence on the needs of the frequency
controlled normal operation reserve can not be specified with the current (hourly) wind power
measurements in Finland. Also sufficient slow reserve capacity and working order must be ensured
when the wind power production increases. Adding wind power to the power system will clearly be
seen in the regulating power market. The current capacity available to the Finnish regulating power
market can be insufficient at times when changes in the power production increase.
KEYWORDS
Reserve, wind power, power variation, power regulation

mikko.holmgren@afconsult.com

CIGRE2009 978-2-85873-080-3

1. Introduction
This paper presents different technical possibilities to regulate the balance between the production and
consumption in Finland. Different types of power plants and loads for regulation are presented.
Especially wind power production changes require regulation capacity and production and
transmission reserves. Based on different wind measurements in Finland, the amount of wind power
variations from hour to hour was calculated for a scenario with 2000 MW wind power in Finland.
Additionally, an estimate of reserves needed for wind power and an analysis of the regulating power
market in Finland was made.
1.1. The Finnish power system
The Finnish transmission grid belongs to the Nordic interconnected synchronous grid. In addition, the
Finnish power system is connected to neighbouring asynchronous systems (Russian and Estonia) with
HVDC links. The peak load is about 15000 MW. The annual electricity consumption has been almost
90 TWh. The installed capacity in Finland is about 17000 MW. The wind power capacity is only 140
MW. There is about 3000 MW hydro power and 13800 MW thermal power installed. [1]
1.2. Wind power integration aspects
Finland has a political goal to increase the wind power capacity to 2000 MW by 2020. Wind power
production is variable. This will affect the balancing power requirements in Finland. The questions
that arise are: What is the total need of balancing power to manage 2000 MW wind power? What are
the activation time requirements of balancing power? Is the existing generating and demand capacity
sufficient?
1.3. Reserves in the Nordic countries
In the Nordic countries there is an agreement of active power reserves. The agreed reserves that are
activated instantly (frequency controlled reserves) and that are activated manually under 15 minutes
are in Table I. [2] [3]
Table I

The agreed active power reserves in the Nordic countries.

Requirements for Nordel / for
Finland

Frequency controlled normal

operation reserve (frequency
area 49.9 - 50.1 Hz)
Frequency controlled
disturbance reserve
(frequency area 49,9-49,5
Hz)
Fast active disturbance
reserve (manually activated,
activation time less than 15
minutes)

Remarks (for Finland)

600 MW / 143MW

Power plants 144 MW

Vyborg DC link max 100 MW
Estonia DC-link max 35 MW

1020 MW / 220-240 MW

Power plants 520 MW

Disconnectable loads 90 MW

- / 1300 MW

Fingrid's own reserve power

plants 615 MW
Contracted capacity 164 MW
Disconnectable loads 425 MW

1.4. Electricity Markets in the Nordic power system

In the Nordic countries there are Nord Pool day-ahead (Elspot) and intra-day (Elbas) markets. In
addition, a common balancing power market is available for Transmission System Operators (TSOs)
only. The bids and offers for the day-ahead market are made for each individual hour of the next day.
The gate closure is at 12 Central European time. The mechanism is implicit auction, since the
transmission capacities are included when the system price is calculated. If there are congestions, the
market is divided into areas, which have different prices. This schedule means that the bids cover the
time span from 12 to 26 hours ahead the gate closure. This is a long time, especially for wind power
producer. It may happen that the trades agreed are not any more suitable.
The intraday market, Elbas, is functioning 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. Also in this market the
bids are made for each hour, but in this market the trades are agreed up to one hour before the delivery
hour.
The multinational regulating power market for Transmission System Operators is a Nordic speciality.
This is separate from the Nord Pool markets. TSOs take care of this market. This market is one way
for TSOs to get upward and downward regulation that they need for keeping the power-frequency
balance inside 49.950.1 Hz. Power producers and consumers can offer upward or downward
regulating power to this market, but only TSOs can use the offers. Most offers in this market are either
Norwegian or Swedish hydro power. The price of each regulating hour is known only after the last
offer is activated. The final price of all regulation to one direction (up or down) during a specific hour
is the same as was the price of the latest offer activated during this hour. If there are congestions in the
grid TSO may activate more expensive offers in the correct location in order not to increase the power
flow in the congested routes. In these occasions there will be different area prices in the regulation
market.
2. Wind power hourly variations
The variability of wind power production in Finland was evaluated using measured hourly data [4] of
Finnish wind turbines, as well as an up-scaled data [5] to represent 2000 MW wind power production
in Finland.
2.1. Measured data
Power measurements on the real measured wind power data in Finland of the years 20052007 were
used. The data include more than 90 % of the installed capacity, from 80 MW in the beginning of
2005 to about 100 MW at the end of 2007. The turbines (about 100) are sited at more than 20 sites,
most of them distributed over the South and West coast of Finland (spreading about 800 km) and in
two sites in Lapland, too. A time series of installed capacity was made for the years 2005-2007.
Dividing the measured produced MWh/h values by the installed MW value at each hour a time series
of wind power production as percentage of installed capacity was acquired. No corrections of the data
were made due to any turbine failures, as no information on exact timing of downtimes was available.
As the average technical availability of the wind turbines in Finland has been 94-95 % during the time
[6] and the number of turbines is quite large (about 100 turbines) we assume here that the data would
represent the production of also larger scale wind power production.
The hourly data was the average power production of each hour. Subtracting the previous hourly
power from the following hourly power, for each successive hour, a time series of hourly variations
was acquired. The maximum variation from hour to hour was 16.2 % of installed capacity from the
20052007 data .The maximum hourly variations in each studied year were 14.5 %, 15.8 %, and 16.2
%. The standard deviation from the time series of variations was 2.7 % of the installed capacity. Five
times standard deviation (5) which is 13.5 % of the normal distribution covers 99.9999 % of all
variations. In this data there were 16 hourly power variations that exceeded 13.5 %. 16 variations
means 0.06 % (16/(38760)100%) of all the hours. This shows that wind power variations are not
normally distributed but there are somewhat more extreme variations in the data.

The more turbines and the more sites there are, the less variability there will be in the wind power
production data in percentages of the installed capacity. It is therefore possible that this 100 MW data
overestimates the variability of the future 2000 MW wind power variations in Finland. However, this
data corresponds to geographically dispersed wind power. On the other hand, if the future wind power
production is concentrated on a smaller area the power variations are underestimated. As a
comparison, the maximum variation inside an hour in Western Denmark, with several thousands of
turbines at several hundreds of sites, is 27 % of capacity, the standard deviation of these hourly
variations is 3.2 % [7]. The variability in Finland is clearly less than that in West Denmark. This is due
to area size: West Denmark is a much smaller region (max 200 km times 300 km) than Finland (wind
turbine sites in an area max 400 km times 800 km).
2.2. 2000 MW scenario
The power measurements on the real measured wind power data in Finland of the years 20052006
were used as a basis when forming a dataset of 2000 MW wind power in Finland. In order to increase
the number of sites, one additional turbine time series (660 kW turbine) as well as two wind speed
measurement time series converted to 2 MW turbine power production were added to the data
described in Section 2.1. The yearly average power production of this data (Section 2.1) was only
moderate (20.8-23.4 % in 20052006). This is why most of the production time series were up-scaled,
as the future 2000 - 4000 MW wind power capacity would include a large share of offshore, better
wind resource sites. As some data was seen to be less representative this was taken into account by
giving a lower weight in the averaging process.
The yearly average power of the up-scaled wind power production time series was 29.3 % in 20052006. By up-scaling the power production time series, also the variations were up-scaled. This was
clearly seen in the calculated values for variability: the maximum hourly production variation was 20
% and the standard deviation 3.4 % of installed wind power capacity.
The distribution of wind turbines for a large scale wind power in Finland will have an impact on the
variability of the production. The installed power in 20052007 is quite well dispersed to the large
area along the West coast. Also the plans for future wind power plants in Finland are dispersed and
mostly situated along the coast. However, some of the several large offshore wind power parks
planned in Finland are concentrated in the northernmost part of the West coast. If several of these are
commissioned, there will be a concentration of power production in one region of about 50x50 km2
and this will add the variability of the total wind power production. It is therefore justified to use a
somewhat overestimated variability data presented here.
2.3. Impact on reserves
Impact on frequency controlled normal operation reserve can not be assessed based on the average
hourly wind power production in this study. The assessment would require preferably second or
minute based data. An effort to estimate the frequency control, momentary reserve time scale impacts
of wind power has been made in some studies [8] [9]. In the very short time scale the increase in
reserve requirement and cost due to wind power has been estimated to be lower than in the 10 minute
and hourly time scale.
The largest wind power variations of geographically dispersed wind power can be considered
equivalent to power system disturbances (the new guiding principle of Finlands TSO). For 2000 MW
wind power in Finland, the maximum hourly variations is assumed to be lower than the designing
criteria for disturbance reserves (N-1 criteria, 1300 MW). Thus, a geographically distributed 2000
MW wind power production capacity is not likely to have an impact on frequency controlled and fast
active disturbance reserve.
Overall usage of condensing power is likely to be decreased due to increasing wind power capacity.
However, this doesnt necessarily mean that the need of condensing power plants in power system
would be decreased. The working order and sufficient slow reserve (condensing power plants)
capacity in the power system must thus be ensured. If the working order isnt ensured the starting
3

times of the condensing power plants will get longer. This will ultimately lead to weakened slow
reserve capacity.
3. Technical possibilities for providing reserves in Finland
3.1. Different generation types
Hydro power offers very good power regulation features. It can be regulated at least 40 % of the
capacity in one minute if there is enough water in the reservoir [10]. The majority of Finlands hydro
power is located in rivers which dont have large reservoirs. The biggest limitation for regulation
capacity of hydro power in Finland is in fact the lack of large reservoirs. The reservoirs and rivers
have legislative limits which define the minimum and maximum water levels.
Gas turbines are capable of performing fast and reliable power regulation, which is done by adjusting
the fuel valve. Gas turbines can be started and synchronised to the power grid in about three minutes.
In general, airplane gas turbines can reach their maximum power output in about five minutes. For
industrial gas turbines this takes about ten minutes. Gas turbines can be regulated at least 40 % of the
capacity in one minute. In Finland the gas turbine starting reliability is set to be higher than 90 %. [10]
Combined heat and power (CHP) plants offer significant resources for power regulation. CHP-plants
have different possibilities to regulate their power output: [11] [12]

By adjusting the regulation valve of the steam turbine the power output of the plant can be
changed. This is based on the stored energy of the steam in the boiler. The electrical power
output can be momentarily increased by opening the valve. For a longer electrical power
increase also the fuel power of the plant must be increased.

By using an auxiliary heat exchanger in the plant the electrical power can be regulated
independently from the heat production. For the auxiliary heat exchanger the plant is basically
like a normal condensing power plant although the fuel consumption is greater than in a
condensing power plant.

By bypassing the condenser in an extraction back pressure plant it is possible to increase

electrical power very quickly. The increase is typically about 1015 % of the district heat
power. The disturbance in the district heat network can be compensated for example by
increasing fuel power of the plant or discharging heat storage.

By bypassing the high pressure preheater typically about 5-10 % increase in the electrical
power can be achieved. However, this creates thermal stresses in the boiler and preheater
because the water temperature can decrease as much as 100 C.

By using heat storages its possible to decrease the dependency between the need of
electricity and need of heat. The electricity production can be adjusted and the excess heat can
be either recharge to or discharge from the heat storage. The storages can be short or long term
storages. The energy efficiency for short term storages is over 90 %.

Combined heat and power plants offer a variety of features for power regulation. However, the power
regulation characteristics in CHP-plants vary from plant to plant and no generally applicable figures
for CHP-plants regulation capacity can be said although they are a significant power regulation
resource.
Condensing power plants fuelled by coal can be regulated by 5 % of its nominal capacity in one
minute by chancing its fuel power. Respectively, the regulation percent for peat fuelled plants is 3 %.
These power regulating figures can be considered as typical and moderate for condensing power
plants. Starting time of a condensing power plant is extremely dependant of the time that has passed
from the last use. Warm plants can be started in some hours but for a cold plant the starting time is
about ten hours. If the start capability of the plant has been neglected, the starting time can be over a
month. [13] [14]
4

Nuclear power plants are often used at their maximum capacity throughout the year which means that
they dont offer any regulation capacity. However, nuclear power plants have interesting power
regulation features. One minute power regulation capability for pressure water nuclear reactors can be
13 % or even between 5 and 10 % of its nominal capacity. Boiling water reactors have extremely fast
power regulation capacity. One second power regulation can be 1 % of the plants nominal capacity at
a power range of 70-100 %. [15]
Wind power offers also some regulation features. It is possible to do downward regulation by
adjusting blade angle of the plant. Also in some occasions upward regulation is possible. This can be
done by utilizing the kinetic energy of the rotor blades [16]. Upward regulation is also possible if the
plant has been restricting its power output and the wind conditions enable regulation [9].
3.2. Other possibilities
Load shedding is an important power regulation resource for disturbances. In Finland, the load
shedding contract is always made between the system operator and the load owner. The
disconnectable loads must have an average usage of over 7000 hours in one year and the load must be
over 15 MW. For the frequency controlled disturbance reserve the load shedding is done at the
frequency of 49.5 Hz. The disconnecting time must be under five seconds. The loads for fast active
disturbance reserve must be disconnected within 15 minutes. Load shedding is very suitable for
disturbance reserves because the power change is very sudden. Load shedding is difficult to
implement on the frequency controlled normal operation reserve due to challenges in linear power
regulation. It is also difficult to do both upward and downward regulation by load shedding.
High Voltage Direct Current links (HVDC-links) can be used as reserves when they are between two
asynchronous systems. DC-links are an important part of the frequency controlled normal operation
reserve in Finland.
4. Experiences of the Finnish regulating power market
This study also examined the changes in Finlands regulating power market in aggregated regulation
bids [17]. The study period was from the August 2006 to beginning of March 2008. The aggregated
regulation bids varied greatly in time as it is shown in Figure 1.
1400

Power [MW]

1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
1.8.2006

1.2.2007

1.8.2007

1.2.2008

Time

Figure 1

Aggregated regulation bids in the Finnish regulating power market in 1.8.20061.3.2008.

Most of Finlands regulation bids consist of hydro power located in rivers. This means that activated
regulation capacity in consecutive hours decreases the aggregated regulation bids during the next
hours.
Volume of regulating power [18] varies also in time. The upward regulation was needed during 21 %
and downward regulation during 25 % of all hours. The maximum upward regulation power was 640
5

MW and respectively for downward regulation 423 MW. In Figure 2 the volume of regulating power
in the research period is presented.
700

Power [MW]

600
500
400
300
200
100
0
1.8.2006

1.2.2007

1.8.2007

1.2.2008

Time

Figure 2

Volume of regulating power in the Finnish regulating power market in 1.8.20061.3.2008.

Adding wind power to the power system will be seen in the regulating market: both the power
variation during the hour and any forecast errors of wind power not corrected before the delivery hour
will increase the use of regulating power from the market [15] [19] [20]. Because about 80 % of the
hours are free from Finnish regulation a great deal of the regulation bids remain at the market from
hour to hour, since they are not used. This can create a faulty impression of the available regulation
capacity. If the power changes in the power system increase, also the need for regulation increases and
after that the aggregated regulation bids will decrease. This makes it extremely difficult to define the
exact capacity of the regulating power market.
The variation in the price of regulating power [18] is dependent both on the regulation bids and the
activated regulation. The more regulation is needed or the less regulation bids are made the higher the
regulation price will be. Several consecutive regulation hours can occasionally result in a peak in the
regulation power price. The sufficiency of the regulating power market can be estimated by examining
the peaks in the regulation power price. In the past years there has been increasing number of peaks in
the regulating power price. In Table II is shown the number of peaks compared to the average upward
regulating price and Helsinki area price.
Table II

Number of peaks in the regulating power price compared to the average upward
regulating price and Helsinki area price at the same hour.
2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

Number of upward regulation peaks

compared to average regulation price

10

11

Number of upward regulation peaks

compared to Helsinki area price at the
same hour

The increased number of peaks in the regulating power price indicates that the capacity of the
regulating power market has been almost completely used from time to time. The examination of the
peaks also indicates that the sufficiency of the regulating power market has been weakened lately.
Sometimes very high regulating prices can be formed as it is shown in Figure 3.

Regulating power price [/MWh]

2500,00
2000,00
1500,00
1000,00
500,00
0,00
1.1.2007

1.4.2007

1.7.2007

1.10.2007

Time

Figure 3

Upward regulating power price in year 2007. High peaks (2000 /MWh) in the
regulating power price are shown in the late January.

5. Estimation for power regulation capacity

Based on the technical possibilities of different power plants in Finland there would be about 21002200 MW of power reserve capacity available in 15 minutes. In this estimation the nuclear power
doesnt provide any power reserve capacity because it is used at its full power all the time except
during the yearly maintenance outage. In this paper the capacity of the condensing power plants arent
included in the estimation, since their starting time is over 15 minutes. Also CHP-plants are left
outside the estimate because different plants have different power regulation characteristics. The
estimated regulating power of hydro turbines is 1400 MW and that of gas turbines is 779 MW. It is
important to remember that the regulation capacity of hydro power varies greatly from hour to hour,
weekly and from season to season. In Table III the estimates for the power regulation capacity
available in 15 minutes in Finland are shown.
Table III

Estimated power regulation capacity available in 15 minutes in Finland.

Hydro
Gas turbine
Condensing
CHP
Nuclear

Power regulation capacity [MW]

1400
779
Not estimated
Not estimated
0

By the year 2015 the need of reserves are estimated to about 1800 MW [21]. When comparing the
need in year 2015 (1800 MW) and the estimated available regulation capacity (2100-2200 MW) it is
obvious that the capacity of the load shedding, condensing power and CHP-plants are viable assets for
regulation capacity.

6. Conclusions
The increase in wind power installed capacity will lead to increased variability in the power system.
The largest wind power variations that occur rarely can be considered equivalent to power system
disturbances. The increased hourly variations dont have an impact on the allocation of frequency
controlled or fast active disturbance reserve if the wind power is geographically distributed and the
largest variations are under the designing criteria (1300 MW).
Adding wind power to the power system will be seen in the Nordic and Finnish part of the regulating
market: both the power variation during the hour and any forecast errors of wind power not corrected
before the delivery hour will increase the use of regulating power from the market. Therefore the
capacity of the Finnish regulating power market can be a problem in the future when the changes in
the power production increase. The high prices on the regulating power market will occur more often
unless more regulation capacity is introduced to the market.
Load shedding and possible demand response are very important resources in power regulation. In
order to keep these in the system, it would be important to have industrial factories in the Finnish
power system also in the future. Otherwise they can not be used for load shedding. Although the use of
condensing power plants can be reduced due to increasing wind power capacity it is important to
ensure its operational condition and capacity in the power system.
Hydro power offers very good power regulation features but the energy dependency of available water
for hydro power regulation should also be remembered. It is essential to ensure sufficient energy
capacity for the regulation. This means further development of the potential regulation capacity of
condensing power and CHP-plants. However, all this capacity needs to be economically profitable.

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