Combining Active Power Curtailment and Dynamic Line Rating in Grid Planning: An Innovative Approach

The increased penetration of renewable energy sources in German energy supply structures requires reinforcing and expanding of electrical grids. Grid planning requires complex calculations to ensure demand-driven, efficient, and environmentally friendly operation of the electrical grids. In order to accelerate the necessary expansion of renewable energy sources, innovative grid planning approaches are of great interest. Two approaches to mitigate the need for grid expansion and to make more efficient use of the existing grid infrastructure are active power curtailment and dynamic line rating. Both approaches benefit each other and can be combined in a technically meaningful way in grid operation and the planning process. In this paper we develop and validate an innovative approach for the simultaneous consideration of active power curtailment and dynamic line rating in the worst-case based planning process of high voltage distribution grids. For that the Combination Factor (CF) is introduced. The CF nearly fully exhausts the 3% criterion in the grid planning process. The hosting capacity can be increased significantly.