A Robust Primary Frequency Response Constrained Unit Commitment Considering Uncertain Frequency Support of Units

Power management in microgrids is a major challenge due to its low total inertia and capacity. The lower the microgrid generation capacity is, the higher the share of each generation unit in total power will be, and the higher the frequency deviation in less time will be when an outage occurs. So, preventive actions can be more reasonable and affordable than corrective actions for microgrid power and frequency control. In this regard, a new primary frequency response-constrained unit commitment model is presented here to prevent excessive frequency deviations by more commitment of higher inertia power plants and more contribution of renewable energy resources or energy storage systems’ fast inertia response. To have a mixed-integer linear programming model, the primary frequency response constraints are linearized. The model is solved by the combination of two commercial solvers named MOSEK and YALMIP in the MATLAB 2018 environment. The proposed model is examined on a real isolated microgrid (an island). The results show that by activating the primary frequency support of distributed energy resources, the power can be managed with lower costs because there will be less need to start up fast (and expensive) gas turbine generation units. In addition, although comparing the model with others shows the more expensive management procedure, better frequency stability is obtained in contingencies.