Absence of pure voltage instabilities in the third order model of power grid dynamics

Abstract

Secure operation of electric power grids fundamentally relies on their dynamical stability properties. For the third order model, a paradigmatic model that captures voltage dynamics, three routes to instability are established in the literature, a pure rotor angle instability, a pure voltage instability and one instability induced by the interplay of both. Here we demonstrate that one of these routes, the pure voltage instability, is inconsistent with Kirchhoff's nodal law and thus nonphysical. We show that voltage collapse dynamics nervertheless exist in the absence of any voltage instability.