IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - March/April 2014 - 20

market integration. a plan for expanding
critical european connections is developed in the ten-year network development plan of enTso-e (the association
of european Transmission operators and
the european Commission); in october
2013, a list of agreed "projects of Common Interest" was published to reinforce
transmission grids. about 100 bottlenecks can be identified on the european

network by the end of the decade (among
them, 40% are interconnectors). of the
bottlenecks, 80% are related to renewable energy sources (ress) integration,
either because the direct connection of
ress is at stake or because the network
section or corridor is a keyhole between
ress and load centers. The north-south
internal corridors in Germany are typical
examples of the latter.

PSC Group offers a range of specialist consulting
services to the electricity industry.
HVDC
Transmission Lines
Control and Market Systems

20

ieee power & energy magazine

Strategy
Electrical Engineering
IT & Telecommunications

Distribution grids at medium and
low voltages cover about 5 million km
of lines and cables and are managed
by about 5,000 distribution operators
in all eu countries. In europe, a large
fraction of the pV and wind generation
is connected at the distribution level,
and this requires a major shift in the
operation of distribution networks.

An Unprecedented
Revolution for the
European System
To fulfil the european climate and
energy policies, the electrical system
is in a period of very fast and radical
evolution with a very high development
of renewable energies. Variable renewable sources already reach more than
20% of the total electric energy mix in
Denmark and will soon reach this level
in Germany, spain, and other countries.
In these countries, the share of instantaneous power from variable, inverterconnected generation has exceeded 50%
of the total generation mix a number of
times. This situation is challenging grid
stability and also impacts the economic
value of the traditional thermal power
portfolio. The time use of gas turbines
has, in some cases, fallen below the
profitability ratio while the flexibility
potential is important to balance the
variability of renewable generation.
The eu power grid can be a facilitator
of the development of the new renewable
portfolio through the mutualization of different energy sources and consumption
patterns as well as through economies
of scale, but it is facing major challenges
in planning, developing, and deploying
the appropriate technology solutions to
respond to the political objectives and
support the convergence to a decarbonized and sustainable economy.
The need for coordinating an r&D
and deployment agenda was already
apparent to stakeholders in europe since
the beginning of 2000. on the basis of
experience in collaborative projects in
successive european framework programs, eu stakeholders involved in the
electricity industry assembled in the
smartGrids european Technology platform for electricity networks of the
march/april 2014
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - March/April 2014
