Emerging technologies in transmission networks

Summary form only given. When a major disturbance occurs, protection and control actions are designed to stop degradation of the system, restore the functionality to a normal state, and minimize the impact of the disturbance. Existing control actions are not designed to respond to a fast-developing disturbance, and may react too slowly. The operator must therefore deal with an extremely complex situation, and must rely on heuristic solutions and policies. Today, local automatic control actions protect the system from the propagation of fast-developing emergencies, but are not equipped to consider the overall system, which may be affected by the disturbance. Wide-area defense is a concept that involves using system-wide information and sending selected local information to a remote location to counteract the propagation of major disturbances. With the increased availability of sophisticated computer, communications and measurement technologies, more "intelligent" equipment can be used at the local level to improve the overall emergency response.