This is the title of the scientific article composed by Astron professionals in the recent issue of Elektrotechnika. The journal of the Hungarian Electrotechnical Association has been published since 1908, and is the most prestigious publication of the local electric power industry.
The power flows on the network at various states was always an interesting topic among network operators and designers. However, they struggled with doing purely analytical (e.g. wye-delta conversions) analysis on the network as it bacame larger. Iterative approximation methods were promising and – due to the computational requirement – they became widespread only with computers more than two decades ago. Since then, load-flow algorithms are continuously evolving, covering many use cases, be it a real time or a special study simulatoin. This and the computational performance of today’s systems made it possible to use them in network training solutions. The article presents an overview on the load flow calculaton inside Network Training Simulator (NTS) software developed by Astron Informatics Ltd. touching general subjects as well as specific challenges we encountered.
The training simulator effectively supports dispatchers’ daily work. The trainings will be really effective if the simulation algorithms are sufficiently fast, robust and accurate. The algorithms of modern load-flow calculation methods are reviewed and compared in this article. Problems, specialties and interactions between load-flow calculation and its surrounding simulation environment occuring in this specific implementation are demonstrated as well as those development possibilities are collected, which will make the trainings more realistic.
The full article can be read in the issue of 2017/10 of Elektrotechnika or can be downloaded here.