Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

12-2018

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Electrical Engineering

Major Professor

Yilu Liu

Committee Members

Khalid Alshibli, Fangxing Li, Hairong Qi

Abstract

Recently, Saudi Arabia is going through a process of developing and modernizing various aspects of life in the country. In order to cope with these changes, reduce local oil consumption, and meet the high electricity demand, the trend has been to introduce renewable energy sources and limit fossil fuels power generation. This expected major renewable revolution in Saudi Arabia, in addition to the significant growth in the current grid size and demand, makes it essential to establish a comprehensive study about the status of the existing grid stability and the impact of incorporating renewable energy.To address the aforementioned changes, an adaptive dynamic model is built based on the Saudi power system real data gathered from public domains. For higher accuracy, the developed model is tested and validated against field measurement data taken using the Frequency Monitoring Network (FNET/GridEye). Indeed, with the increasing penetration of the renewable energy, the voltage stability becomes one of the challenges to the existing power grid. The voltage stability status of the Saudi grid is firstly investigated and the recommended measures are implemented to ensure the stability of the network before integrating high level of renewable energy. Regarding solar energy, the information about solar radiation in Saudi Arabia proves the fact that most of the locations in the Kingdom are suitable for installing solar planets. Thus, a large amount of solar energy is added to the Saudi power system in all operating areas. This research work explores the impact of the increased amount of solar energy on the frequency response of the Saudi grid under different disturbances and outage events. Having determined the adverse impact on the frequency response, this dissertation further analyzes some mitigation measures utilized to prevent frequency response degradation. Further, several dynamic stability studies are conducted to notice the effect on the inter-area oscillations and the rotor angle stability of the Saudi system when several photovoltaic penetration levels are introduced.

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