Power Engineering - UCTE advances East-West transmission cooperation

27 December 2006 -- The Union for the Coordination of Transmission of Electricity (UCTE) is making progress in its endeavors to project the feasibility of more East-West cooperation in European transmission systems.

UCTE, which is the European association of transmission system operators, released a study investigating the feasibility of a possible synchronous interconnection of the power systems of IPS/UPS in eastern European states with UCTE throughout continental Europe.

The IPS/UPS system comprises the power systems of the Baltic States (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia), Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

UCTE announced two major milestones have been reached in December: a load flow study model was jointly prepared by experts from both parties and the Project Status Summary has been issued. First simulations do not allow to identifying fundamental technical barriers to a positive assessment of the feasibility of a synchronous operation between both systems.

The UCTE-IPS/UPS Study was launched in April 2005 to investigate the feasibility of a possible synchronous interconnection of the power systems of IPS/UPS with UCTE. Today both electricity systems operate independently and are serving more than 700 million people in ten time zones.

Initially, a load flow study model of the transmission systems spanning a geographical extension from Portugal to the Bering Sea was jointly prepared by experts from both parties. The simulation model reflects a peak load case with a time horizon of 2008 and a total load of 580 GW. The first simulations performed until now are solely dedicated to the steady state load flow. They do not allow for identifying fundamental technical barriers to a positive assessment of the feasibility of a synchronous operation between IPS/UPS and UCTE.

Beginning in 2007, UCTE will start the next step by investigating the dynamic behavior once both systems would be synchronously interconnected. Due to the fact that the dynamic behavior may reveal the most limiting criteria for a synchronous system extension, this analysis will be the first crucial criterion for the mere technical assessment of the feasibility of a possible synchronous interconnection.

A further important milestone within the project is the issue of the Project Status Summary that reflects the status of work as of December 2006. A comprehensive interim report about the project status and first results about the technical, operational, organisational and legal work for the time being is planned to be finalized in February 2007.

In 2008 the study will deliver an evaluation of the feasibility of a possible synchronous interconnection taking into account the technical, operational and organizational issues and reliability standards including their legal and contractual framework. Also a table of necessary investments to be made on both sides will be provided. Once finalized, the study will present an open outlook on other non-synchronous system coupling possibilities aimed at a global benchmark in terms of economic efficiency for the investigated system coupling.

The study results will be used as a basis for decisions on the further developments of the systems concerned. All this may result in a timeline for the possible industrial implementation of the study results. Any decisions need to be made by stakeholders taking into account further fundamental boundary conditions of the East-West cooperation in Europe in the field of Electricity.

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