FAST: A Power System Simulation API to Train Nuclear Plant Operators Facing the Energy Transition
(Room Rheinsaal 6)
28 Jun 17
11:00 AM
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12:30 PM
Tracks:
Track B - Mastering the Digital Era
A few years after the liberalisation of the electricity market in Europe, the world of the power systems faces a new revolution, driven by the energy transition: increasing penetration of renewable energy sources, large scale deployment of smart grids, growing role of electronic devices in grids and in generation, etc. All these drivers modify deeply the structure of the energy systems, but also how they are planned and operated. All the actors of the sector - power producers, transmission and distribution operators as well as market players - have to adapt themselves to cope with this changing environment, and they have to learn how to interact all together. From now on, every actor cannot act independently, but must behave as a link in the chain and be aware of the global context in which it plays. In this new paradigm, the professional training can help broadening the skill of the operators, but the training tools need to reflect this new operational context. Indeed, the former tools were focusing generally on one aspect in the chain, for instance the power generation or the transmission, with a minimalist representation of the rest of the system. The next generation of tools has to propose a holistic approach where the systemic behaviour is modelled at some extent. This is especially true for the nuclear power plants, where the operators have to provide new services, e.g. the participation to the frequency regulation or the system restoration in case of black-out. In this paper, we present a training system which has been delivered recently to a Belgian nuclear power plant. This system covers the simulation of the power plant and the transmission grid. Thanks to that model, the interactions between the plant and grid are accurately modelled. Operators learn to manage contingencies affecting either the plant or the grid, and they learn how to interact with a pump storage unit to restore the system and to resynch it to the UCTE.