Power System Risk Assessment Method Based on
Dynamic Power Flow
YE Xiaohui, ZHONG Wuzhi, SONG Xinli
Power System Department
China Electric Power Research Institute
Haidian District, Beijing 100192, China
yexiaohui@epri.sgcc.com.cn
Abstract—Risk assessment theory is paid more and more
attention to consider the random characteristics of power
system, but traditional method could not consider the
operating factors as frequency response of generators and
loads, various emergency control measures. In this paper, a
dynamic contingency analysis method base on dynamic load
flow is proposed considering the above factors. The dynamic
contingency analysis is a less time-consuming approach, but
could simulate as well the detailed load shedding relay model,
and the time-varying reliability model. So the proposed
dynamic contingency analysis gives a good tool for cascading
failure simulation.
Keywords-dynamic power flow, risk assessment method,
generator model, dynamic contingency analysis
I. INTRODUCTION
Because ofthe volatile of user's load demand, accidental
failures of electric equipment, and fast-growing renewable
generating capacity, the power system has random
characteristics and sometimes operates on highly stressed
and unpredictable conditions, which makes planning
difficult. Deterministic approaches, such as N-1 criterion,
scanning subjective contingency set cannot satisfy the needs
of modern power system. On the other hand, power system
risk assessment theory employs the stochastic methods to
quantify the ability of a power system to provide supply of
electrical energy [1], and it could consider the adequate and
secure risk of power system failures [2][3],
In aspect of power system risk evaluation area, recently
research advancements can be divided into two
classifications: components risk model [4][5], and bulk
power system risk evaluations. Then traditional bulk power
system risk theory is divided into two categories: adequacy
evaluation and security evaluation. Adequacy is the ability
of the system to meet the load demand, within component
ratings and voltage limits, taking into account planned and
unplanned component outages. Security is the ability ofthe
system to withstand disturbances without losing system
instability [6].
To consider the possibility thoroughly, the reliability
theory analyze more contingencies than deterministic
method, which is time-consuming, so the contingency
Supported by Youth Foundation of China Electric Power Research
Institute (XT84-15-001).
978-l-5090-1970-0/16/$31.00 ©2016 IEEE
CHENG Lin
Electrical Engineering Department
Tsinghua University
Haidian District, Beijing 100084, China
chenglin@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn
analysis method is very important, the traditional approach
uses DC power flow and linear programming or AC power
flow based optimal power flow (OPF) to calculate the
minimal load shedding at each bus subject to a set of
constraints, the calculation speed ofthe former one is faster
than the latter one, while the latter one are more accurate.
On the other hand, a power system is deemed secure
according with its ability to withstand disturbances. Power
systems are designed to provide an adequate and secure
service. Therefore, protection and control must guarantee
service adequacy under normal operation conditions. In
case of disturbances, protection and control must stabilize
the system and minimize the impact ofthe disturbance.
The traditional reliability theory is wildly applied in
power system planning, but there are still some drawbacks
as follow:
1) The power flow in contingency analysis could not
consider the operating factors as frequency response of
generators and loads, various emergency control measures.
And the calculated load curtailment is the minimum
possible value different from the real load curtailment
which is dependent upon power system dynamics [7].
2) There are many different types of interactions by
which failures can propagate during the course of a
blackout. For example, a transmission line tripping can
cause a transient, the overloading of other lines, the mal-
operation or mis-operation of relays, reactive power
problems, or can contribute to system instabilities or
operator stress.
3) The failure rate is time-varying under different
condition. For example, a component is getting easier to fail
with its increasing age; a component's failure rate changes
in different weather conditions, and it needs more time to be
repaired under bad weather; transmission lines are easier to
be tripped by protect relays when it is overloaded.
Therefore the assumption that reliability parameters are
constant is unwarranted. A condition-dependent reliability
model is needed to be employed.
In this paper, a dynamic contingency analysis method
base on dynamic load flow is proposed considering the
above factors. The dynamic power flow is a less time-
consuming approach, but could simulate as well the
dynamic of generators, primary frequency control and
PMAPS 2016
automatic generation control system.
II. TRADITIONAL CONTINGENCY ANALYSIS METHOD
In each contingency, the system should meet several
constraints, for example, the total power of generators must
match the total load demand, power on transmission lines
should be within its capacity limit, and abnormal voltage of
each bus need to be cleared up. If the above constraints are
not met, remedial actions provide means of correcting
abnormal conditions, such as generator rescheduling and
shunt switching, etc. In case of inadequacy, remedial
actions will involve load shedding, which is recorded as a
system failure. Results of the contingency evaluations are
stored to calculate reliability indices.
For reliability analysis, the contingency analysis is
important to calculate load-shedding relative index, and the
process is much computation-consuming. To calculate
minimal load shedding, multiple solutions of power flow
problem are required to obtain a feasible solution satisfying
constrains in power system, sometime optimal power flow
(OPF) is carried out.
DC power flow is the most simplified method to
approximate power flow problem, which can get one
solution even in incorrect condition, because DC power
flow reduces the problem down to a set of linear equations.
And the DC based OPF is a simplified linear optimization
problem which is often used in practice, especially for
analysis of very large systems. The drawback is that only
angles and active power flows are calculated, so it ignores
the voltage problem raised in real power system.
AC power flow, with Gauss-Seidel or Newton-Raphson
method, deals with a set of nonlinear equations. If the
system operates in abnormal state, corrective actions are
carried out in order to bring power system to meet the
operating constrains.
AC based OPF is the best method to calculate the least
load shedding as consequences of one contingency, but
non-linear optimization problem is a difficult task [8] , then
more effective and least time-consuming methods are
proposed to calculate the minimum interruption of loads.
The load curtail strategy by near [9] and central relaxation
based curtail strategy [10] are faster, but the results are not
optimal. The regional power flow sensitivity is presented in
[11] to calculate the load curtailment, and the improved
algorithm provides faster execution time without
compromising the quality of solutions obtained.
The traditional contingency analysis method is suitable
for solving adequacy of system, and ignores the operational
modes. There are many special modes appearing in real
system. For example, not all of the generators are spinning
standby to bear the load immediately; some equipment
without failure is not available during its maintenance
process; construction of transmission line is stage by stage,
and its capacity will change by uprating project. So a novel
contingency analysis under special operational mode is
desired.
III. DYNAMIC POWER FLOW EQUATION
The conventional power flow equations assume a
balanced situation, in which total generation satisfied total
load and losses in power system, and all of the unbalanced
power is beard by a special chose bus, slack bus. The
concept of slack bus is mathematical one, and does not exist
in real power system. Moreover, after power system
operation process, open circuit, generator out of operation
or considerable change in load, the unbalance power is
beard by all the generators according to their inertia
constants, primary frequency regular property of governors,
or secondary regular parameters.
The paper builds dynamic power flow equations to
consider above factors. The unbalance active power Pacc is
calculate as (1):
=
Pacc Σ ί = ι PGI — Σ ^ = ι PLJ ~ PLOSS (1)
where
V=total number of bus
PGi=total active power of generators in bus i
PLj=total loads in busj
P s
LoS total loss in power grid
=
Then, the frequency deviation Af of system can be
represented as:
where
KGt =total sum of the slope of the frequency response
characteristic on bus i
KLj =total sum of load frequency regulation control factor
in bus j
Real active power of generators and loads are functions
of frequency deviation Af:
PGt = PGi0 + KGi • Af (3)
PL; = PLjo + KLj • Af (4)
where
PGÍ0 =initial active power of generators in bus i under
normal frequency
PLj0= initial loads in b u s j under normal frequency
KGi and KLj are the frequency response coefficient of
generators and load. In general, KLJ=l~3, that is to say, PLj
changes about 1 % ~ 3 % when frequency deviation Δ / = 1 % .
KGi is difficult to calculate as shown in Fig. 1, for it is
dependent of generators' inertia constants M, primary
frequency control parameter R, and power order APAGC
from automatic generation control. The factors above have
different response time, and this paper focus on second
time-scale, so coefficient of primary frequency regulation is
chosen as KGi.
Figure 1. The generator simplified dynamic model
 Assuming m is the number of PQ nodes, the dimension
of traditional power flow is (N+m-1). Adding a new state
value Δ/ the dynamic power flow problem can be presented
as (V+m)-dimensional system of non-linear equations as
following:
ΙΔΡ =PG„ - PL„ +(KG + KL )Δ/ -V ¿ V (o^coss, + B, sins, )
- =
I AQ. = QG, -QL-ν,JV, (Gilsinl,il-BilcosSil)
The equations are similar with traditional ones, so it can
be solved using Newton method.
IV. RISK ANALYSIS MOTHOD
Dynamic power flow is a good tool to simulate dynamic
response of power system approximately in each
contingency, and could be used in contingency analysis.
Moreover, in cascading failure analysis, a transmission line
tripping can cause a transient, the overloading of other lines,
the mal-operation or mis-operation of relays. For
components' failure rate is changing under different
operation condition [12] , a time-varying reliability model
should be used after calculation of each dynamic power
flow.
A. Detailed Load Shedding Relay Model
Taking the advantages of dynamic power flow, more
detailed load shedding strategy could be employed to
calculate the load curtailment.
Under-frequency load shedding relay will cut off load
when frequency is lower than the setting value to make sure
the stability of power system. Normally, there are
sequential rounds and special rounds as shown in Fig. 2:
sequential rounds act one by one, special rounds act under
urge situation quicker than sequential rounds.
Under-voltage load shedding relay cuts local loads, and it
acts according to the voltage of local key bus. So there are
several rounds with different action threshold value. Over-
voltage relay is placed on generator to protect generator
from extreme heating, and generator will be cut off under
over voltage condition.
f ä f,„ SeqRoundl
-SeqRound*
fä SpRound!
f ä f,p2 • SpRound2
Figure 2. The under-frequency load shedding relay model
B. Time-varying Reliability Model
When a transmission line or transformer is overheated
or/and overloaded, it will be tripped off by current-
controlled overload relays.
In the practical statistic work of lines' reliability data, the
outage probabilities of lines are not classified according to
the transfer capacity. Therefore the relation between outage
probabilities and transfer capacity is not obtained.
(5) Assuming the following three conditions, F{L), the curve of
lines' outage probability changing with transfer capacity, is
obtained, as shown in figure 3.
F
L-omal L-ormal L l
Figure 3 Line's outage probability-transfer capacity curve
C. Contingency Analysis Process
So as shown in Fig. 4, the simplified procedure of
dynamic contingency analysis is summarized as follow:
Stepl: Analyze the initial contingency, and deal with the
network islands. Calculate the unbalanced power Pacc
using (1);
Step2: Determine the frequency deviation using (2);
Step3: Use detailed low cycle load reduction relay model
to determine whether the low-frequency load shedding acts.
If frequency is lower than the value of sequential rounds,
load cut off one round, if frequency is lower than the value
of special rounds, it acts immediately, and then go back to
stepl to recalculate unbalanced power Pacc and frequency
deviation;
Step4: Calculate dynamic power flow using (5);
Step5: Use detailed low-voltage and high-voltage load
reduction relay model to determine whether the load
shedding happens;
Step6: Update the failure rate of abnormal components,
and simulate the cascading process by Monte-Carlo method,
if there is another device fail, go back to stepl;
Step7: Summarize the total load curtailment, and use the
value as the result of contingency.
D. Operational Risk Assessment
j
Dynamic contingency analysis based risk evaluation
process is shown in Fig. 5.
1). Calculate the initial failure rate of each component
according to element's reliability models based on the real-
time operating conditions;
ί 2). Simulate and give out possible contingency by means
ί
:
Special
Rounds
of Monte-Carlo simulation method;
|
3). Consider each contingency, and calculate its load
curtailment results using dynamic contingency analysis
method;
4). Calculate reliability indices according to the
definition of reliability index, the product of faults
probability and faults consequence.
 Network island analysis and calculate
the unbalanced power Pacc using (1)
Solve dynamic power flow using (5)
i [2]
If voltage is abnormal, calculate load
curtailment using abnormal-voltage
load shedding model
Refresh the failure rate of the
components, and simulate cascading
failure of abnormal components
Figure 4. The diagram of dynamic contingency analysis
Figure 5. The diagram of risk analysis process
V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a dynamic power flow based contingency
analysis method is proposed. The analysis process can
simulate the dynamic of power system, and the calculated
load curtailment is more accurate than traditional OPF
based one by means of detailed load shedding relay model.
After applying dynamic contingency analysis method, the
operational risk evaluation method assesses the adequacy of
a power system to supply power to its customers under real-
time operating conditions.
Moreover, dynamic power flow based contingency
analysis method could also get the cascading routine, which
is important in cascading failure analysis. And cascading
failure process is also our future work.
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