Active network management on islanded systems: The shetland experience

The Northern Isles New Energy Solutions (NINES) project is addressing the energy needs of the Shetland Isles by demonstrating the integration of low-carbon energy sources using smart grid technology. In so doing, NINES represents a major step towards a low-carbon future for Shetland whilst leading and informing the UK-wide transition. The principal objective is to accommodate more renewable connections in an area that has some of the richest renewable energy resources in Europe but is restricted by existing network infrastructure. This paper discusses the role of modelling in establishing constraint rules and the use of those rules in an Active Network Management (ANM) scheme on Shetland. The constraint rules are modelled in offline analysis to calculate the impact of the ANM scheme on the network access of potential customers and to model the dynamic response of the network. The rules are then implemented in the ANM software to manage the output of ANM-controlled generation in real time.