Primary Frequency Regulation by Demand Side Response

Recently, there have been growing attempts to replace conventional power generators with renewable energy sources. However, the inertia reduction that results from such measures jeopardizes the stability of the power system. Typically, power system operators utilize the spinning generating units to provide the required capacity to preserve system frequency where the carbon emission and wear/tear costs considerably affect their feasibility. Instead, this paper investigates the ability to use the existing assets (i.e., controllable demands) in providing the regulation needed to maintain the frequency within the allowable ranges. The proposed study reveals that the dynamically controlled space heaters were able to provide a fast primary response without a significant impact on the regular operation of the heaters. The proposed approach successfully reduced the conventional generator's regulating capacity during a sudden loss of generation/or a sudden increase in demand. Highlighting the impact of inertia reduction on the overall performance concludes the proposed study.