Technical and economic analysis of reactive power support from wind generators as ancillary services providers

• Grant number: 14/16813-3
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: November 01, 2014
• End date: October 31, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Electrical Engineering - Power Systems
• Principal Investigator: Thales Sousa
• Grantee: Thales Sousa
• Host Institution: Centro de Engenharia, Modelagem e Ciências Sociais Aplicadas (CECS). Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC). Ministério da Educação (Brasil). Santo André , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The changes in the mundial and Brazilian electricity sector are directly related to the operation of the interconnected systems and market of power generated. In this new context, we obtained the separation of generation, transmission and distribution activities, so that purchasing power should involve the payment of a product, the energy, and the payment of a set of services so that the agents are adequately compensated and operating requirements are met. This services are called Ancillary Services and are necessary for the operation of the Interconnected System (SIN). In the SIN, the reactive power support is defined as an Ancillary Service and is usually provided by synchronous machines. With the increase of the wind power in the energy mix is expected that wind turbines can also contribute to the generation of reactive power, both in steady state and in transient conditions. In this sense, this project proposes an analysis of technical and economic feasibility for defining the limits of the provision of Ancillary Service support of reactive power from wind turbines. For both, the technical feasibility analysis will be made from a modeling an optimization problem and the analysis of economic feasibility will be based on fixed and variable costs and the Opportunity Cost related to service delivery. The methodology is validated through testing in actual test grids (benchmarks). (AU)