Gereon Recht | Searcharxiv

arXiv2026

The Benefits of an Integrated Approach for Stability-Constrained Power System Planning

Increasing penetration of inverter-based resources in today's power systems requires substitution of the contribution from synchronous generators to dynamic voltage stability and inertial response. However, established approaches for power system planning are sequential, as stabilising measures are only considered at a later stage of the planning process. We investigate the advantages of an integrated approach for power system planning, where stabilising measures are considered simultaneously with the expansion of generation, transmission, and storage systems via simplified stability constraints on inertia and voltage stability. We find that system costs are reduced with the integrated approach and that the dual-use option of grid-forming battery energy storage systems is favoured over other stabilising measures like static synchronous compensators.

math.OC↗

arXiv2026

Improving Operational Feasibility in Large-Scale Power System Planning

Large-scale power system planning mostly uses linearized, active power only approximations of the power flow equations, ignores many operational constraints, and tests the operational feasibility of the resulting systems only under strongly simplifying assumptions. We propose an approach to obtain solutions to large instances of the alternating current capacity expansion problem via redispatch and reinforcement of an initial solution. The problem formulation considers simultaneous expansion of generators, reactive compensation devices, storage systems, and transmission. Furthermore, it includes operational constraints via startup procedures and capability curves of power sources and simplified stability limits via constraints on voltage angle differences and voltage magnitudes. To obtain initial solutions, we test several established and partly modified power flow approximations and integrate them into an approach for iterative transmission expansion planning, thereby obtaining convex formulations. We demonstrate the approach on large problem instances covering the islands of Great Britain and Ireland at the transmission level, for which we extend the open data source to model reactive power. We find that including transmission losses to determine the initial solution is most decisive, as the amount of redispatch and reinforcements necessary to obtain an alternating current feasible solution is reduced, whereas incorporating reactive power constraints did not lead to further improvements. Our approach ensures an alternating current feasible system under weak assumptions, thus guaranteeing steady-state voltage stability and allowing subsequent dynamic grid simulations, which is instrumental for planning stable future inverter-dominated power systems.

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