Electricity network reliability planning and evaluation considering flexible solutions

Amid contemporary electric power system planning and operating regimes, the transmission network is pervasively operated, and planned, with time-invariant thermal ratings (TITRs) of transmission assets. This results in a transmission network which is not fully (and efficiently) utilized. In the future, however, power systems will be increasingly expected to transition into a smart grid-in order to be more efficient and economical. Consequently, the network will pervasively have to be operated, and planned, with time-varying thermal ratings (TVTRs) of transmission assets. Moreover, the smart grid will further facilitate the inclusion of demand response (DR) into the transmission network planning process. Therefore, this paper aims to discuss the need for, and implications of, adopting novel electricity network reliability planning and evaluation methodical approaches which consider flexible solutions (i.e., DR and TVTR). Subsequently, in order to encourage the adoption of these proposed approaches, the quantification of the benefits from increased, efficient and economical transmission utilization considering flexible concepts such as non-ageing TVTR, controlled-ageing of transmissions assets due to advanced operation of TVTR, and DR within transmission system are performed-and evaluated. The IEEE 24-bus RTS is used under sequential Monte Carlo simulation (SMCS) modelling of the reliability evaluation process in order to validate the proposed methodological enhancements and to evaluate network performance.