Renewable Energy Integration

Using HVDC Transmission

Systems
Cristian Pool Linares Sánchez – A00958484
Advisor: Armando Llamas
Maestría en Ciencias con especialidad en Ingeniería Energética
 Introduction

 Renewable energy has received a major

impetus due to ever increasing demand
for energy and depleting fossil fuel
reserves.
 Fossil fuels are limited in supply and the
reserves are concentrated in a few
countries; thereby raising energy security
concerns.
 In the last couple of decades, there has
been a lot of research and development in
field of electricity generation from wind
turbines and solar panels.
 HVAC AND HVDC
OPTIONS FOR
RENEWABLE ENERGY
INTEGRATION
HVAC AND HVDC OPTIONS RENEWABLE ENERGY INTEGRATION

 A vast majority of generation, transmission,

distribution and consumption of electric power is in
the form of AC. Hence, HVAC transmission is the
obvious choice for the grid connection of wind farm.
Most of the operational wind farms are connected
using HVAC connection.
 However, HVAC cable transmission suffers from the
excessive reactive current drawn by the cable
capacitances. Not only this increases the cable
losses and reduces the power transfer capability of
the cables, but also demands reactive shunt
compensation to absorb the excessive reactive
power and avoid over-voltage.
 There is no reactive power generation or
absorption in HVDC transmission systems.
Hence, HVDC transmission is very suitable
for bulk power transmission over long
distances. This has been one of the driving
factors for the development of HVDC
systems since the first commercial
installation in Gotland in the year 1954.

HVDC
Transmission
Systems
The advantages of HVDC systems are fast
and reversible power flow, asynchronous
and decoupled connection of two grids,
frequency control and power oscillation
damping capabilities.
LCC-based Systems

 LCC-based HVDC terminals use thyristor-bridge

converters, which require a stable AC voltage for
commutation. These converters absorb reactive power
as current is always lagging behind the voltage.
 The reactive power (VAr) requirements for the LCC
terminals is of the order of 60% of the active power
rating; though actual reactive power absorption depends
upon the power flow level.
 Large capacitive filters are used to provide reactive
power to the terminals and filter out the low frequency
harmonics.
 LCC-bases HVDC cannot be connected to weak AC
grids due to risk of commutation failures.
LCC-based Systems
Voltajes de Salida con distintos
ángulos de disparo

Convertidor Ideal
 VSC-based Systems
 Voltage Source Converters (VSC) use high voltage Insulated Gate Bipolar
Transistor (IGBTs) capable of carrying high currents and switching at high
frequency of a few kHz for pulse width modulation.

 VSC’s are capable of operating in all four quadrants on the active power (P)
and reactive power (Q) plane. Depending upon the requirements, the VSC
can be operated to supply or absorb reactive power from the grid.

 Since VSC-based HVDC uses high frequency PWM technique for the AC to
DC conversion and nd vice-versa, it does not introduce any low frequency
harmonics.
VSC-based
Systems
 Key features of VSC-based HVDC

a. Control of power flow

b. Frequency and voltage control on the wind farm
c. Grid frequency regulation
d. Power oscillation damping
e. Control of the reactive power generation or absorption
f.
VSC-based Voltage regulation by virtue of reactive power control

g. Dynamic voltage stability and flicker mitigation

Systems h. Black start capability

i. Improvement in power system stability by fast and dynamic control of
both the active and reactive power injection at the point of common
coupling

j. Asynchronous mode of operation

k. Compact converters (as compared to LCC)

l. Low filtering requirements as the first characteristic harmonics is in the
order of a few kHz.
 Disadvantages of VSC-based HVDC

a. More expensive converters

VSC-based b. More switching losses in VSC, a typical LCC HVDC converter station has

Systems power losses of around 0.7% at full load (per end, excluding the HVDC
line or cable) while with 2-level voltage-source converters the equivalent
figure is 2-3% per end.
VSC-bases HVDC for Wind
Farm Grid Integration

 When the wind farm is connected

to the grid by VSC-HVDC, it may
be operated as a generator with
controllable active and reactive
power.
 Unlike LCC-HVDC, VSC-based
systems poses no limitation on the
minimum active power flow.
  Show the potential benefits of using HVDC links to
integrate renewable energy sources to the national grid
such as:
 Reduce losses associated with transmission over long

Thesis Objective distances.

 Increase the potential of installed capacity by 268% (from
158,302 MW in scenario 3 to 583,200 MW in scenario 1).
 Reduce problems with economic dispatch and grid
congestion.