Inertia estimation of the GB power system using synchrophasor measurements

A novel procedure for estimating the total inertia of the Great Britain (GB) power system is presented. Following an instantaneous in-feed loss, regional variations in the estimate of inertia are obtained from measured frequency transients using installed synchronised phasor measurement units (PMUs). A method is proposed to first detect a suitable event for analysis, and then filter the measured transients in order to obtain a reliable estimate of inertia for a given region of the GB network. The total inertia for the whole system is then calculated as a summation, with an estimate also provided as to the contribution to inertia from residual sources, namely synchronously connected demand and embedded generation. The approach is first demonstrated on the full dynamic model of the GB transmission system, before results are presented from analyzing the impact of a number of instantaneous transmission in-feed loss events using phase-angle data provided by PMUs from the GB transmission network and also devices installed at the domestic supply at 4 GB universities.