A Review of Key Power System Stability Challenges For Large-Scale PV Integration

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/rser
A review of key power system stability challenges for

large-scale PV integration
Rakibuzzaman Shah a,n, N. Mithulananthan a, R.C. Bansal b, V.K. Ramachandaramurthy c
a
School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QDL, Australia
Department of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa
c
Department of Electrical Power Engineering, Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Kajang, Malaysia
b
art ic l e i nf o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 30 April 2014
Received in revised form
14 August 2014
Accepted 17 September 2014
Available online 17 October 2014
Global warming is the main driving force behind worldwide interest for the generation of bulk electrical
energy from renewable sources. As a consequence of advancements in solar cell fabrication and
converter technology, solar PV has emerged as one of the most promising renewable sources for bulk
power generation. If the current commissioning rate continues, PV power would lead to the modication
of several aspects of power system and could inuence the stability of the system. This paper extensively
reviews the technical challenges, on particular, the stability issues associated with the integration of
large-scale PV into the power system. In addition, the paper also reviews the dynamic model of largescale PV for stability studies as well as the grid codes for large-scale PV integration into the system.
Finally, this paper summarizes the research ndings about the technical solutions to overcome the
power system stability challenges regarding the large-scale PV integration into the transmission and
sub-transmission or medium voltage distribution system.
& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Grid code
Large-scale PV
Modelling
Power system stability
Reactive power support
Contents
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Current trends and future projections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Grid integration challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Modelling of large-scale PV for stability studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.1.
PV array model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.2.
PV model for steady state analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.3.
PV model for dynamic analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Impact on power system stability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.1.
Voltage stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.2.
Rotor angle stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.2.1.
Transient stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.2.2.
Small signal stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.3.
Frequency stability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Grid code of operation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.1.
Reactive power support and voltage regulation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.
Dynamic regulation requirement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Technical solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7.1.
Frequency regulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7.2.
Low frequency oscillation damping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7.3.
Voltage regulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7.4.
Fault-ride through . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: md.shah@uqconnect.edu.au (R. Shah), mithulan@itee.uq.edu.au (N. Mithulananthan), rcbansal@ieee.org (R.C. Bansal),
vigna@uniten.edu.my (V.K. Ramachandaramurthy).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2014.09.027
1364-0321/& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436
8. Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1434
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1435
1. Introduction
In recent years, the need for clean energy in an effort to reduce
emissions and minimize reliance on fossil fuels has led to worldwide installation of large-scale renewable energy systems.
In 2009, European Union Renewable Energy Directive has set a
target of generating over 32% of total power from renewable
energy by 2030, with a target of 100% by 2050 [1]. In addition,
following the energy sector regulation in China, USA, Canada,
India, and Australia, large-scale renewable generations are
expected to be integrated into the existing grid in the foreseeable
future. Among numerous renewable resources, wind and solar are
the two most promising resources for producing electrical energy
in large quantities. Research study has revealed that at each
instant, the earth surface receives approximately 1.8 1011 MW
of power from solar radiation which is much more than the total
global consumption of power [2]. Another study shows that
electricity demand of entire Europe, Mediterranean, and North
African region can be supplied by building solar facilities in the
Sahara Desert [3]. Fig. 1 illustrates the world solar energy map.
From the gure, it can be seen that most of the countries except
those above latitude 501N and below 501S have huge potential for
solar power generation [4]. Moreover, there are some hot spots
on earth e.g., the Mojave Desert in USA, the Sahara and Kalahari
Desert in Africa, the Middle East, the Chilean Atacama Desert, and
the North-West of Australia. It is believed that the establishment

of large-scale solar facilities in those hot spots could meet the
entire world demands for electricity.
There are two distinct methods for solar power generation
namely solar photovoltaic and concentrated solar thermal.
Between the two, solar photovoltaic is the matured and nancially
viable options for power generation [5]. Solar Photovoltaic (PV)
plants (henceforth referred to as PV plants) directly converts
sunlight into electricity without any rotating machine. The attractive features of PV systems are modularity, low maintenance and
operation cost, low weight, environmental cleanliness and so on.
Mostly, individual capacity of PV module ranges from 100 W to
320 W [6]. A several thousands of such PV modules need to be
connected in order to get the MW range of power from PV system,
thereby, requiring signicant land area for the deployment of a
large-scale PV. Beside the signicant land area requirement, higher
setting up cost compared to other renewable technologies, and
intermittent output with a low capacity factor are the other
limitations of this generation technology.
Historically PV installations have been small and distributed.
Until 2009, majority of PV plants were connected at distribution
levels, either on the secondary side of the local distribution
transformers or primary distribution systems. However, after the
installation of rst ever transmission level (230 kV) utility-scale PV
plant in USA (Desoto Solar Energy Centre in Florida) [7], the interest
Fig. 1. World solar energy map [4].
Table 1
A general comparison among PV, wind and conventional power plants.
Characteristics
PV
Wind
Conventional generator
Fluctuation
Cost for large-scale
Maintenance cost
Inertia
Capacity factor
Annual growth in electric power sector
High
High
Minimal
No inertia
Very low
Very high
Low
Moderate
High
Low inertia
Low to moderate
High
No
Low to moderate
Moderate
Large inertia
High
High
in large-scale PV in transmission and sub-transmission systems has

continued to grow. It is believed that integration of large-scale PV
(from ten to several hundreds MWs) to the grid would not be trivial
especially for the high penetration level. Utilities are expected to
face some new non-traditional operational problems due to the
distinctly different in dynamic characteristics of large-scale PV
compared to the conventional generators and its counterpart wind
power. Table 1 shows the general comparison among PV, wind and
conventional power plants.
From Table 1 it is evident that variability, often referred to as
intermittency, of PV output power is one of the concerns for grid
operation. The future power system has to deal with not only the
uncontrollable demand but also uncontrollable generation. The
other major concern as depicted in Table 1 with large-scale PV is
that it has no inertia; integration of such generation will reduce
the effective inertia of the system. In a reduced inertia system,
following the disturbance, the effective aggregated angular separation could be high, requiring larger restoring force to bring the
machines back to the equilibrium. Carrying this extra burden
would stress synchronous generators that coexist with the renewable generators and could lead to instability problems. Moreover,
the other major aspect about the integration of PV to the system is
the de-commissioning of synchronous generators with auxiliary
support such as Automatic Voltage Regulator (AVR) for dynamic
VAr support. The loss of these auxiliary devices will have signicant impact on system stability. In this paper, the technical
concerns regarding the large-scale PV integration to the transmission and sub-transmission or medium voltage distribution systems
are reviewed along with the possible mitigation strategies for a
wide-spread deployment of large-scale PV to the system.
The reminder of the paper is organized as follows: Section 2
highlights the worldwide current trends and future projections of
large-scale PV integration. Section 3 briey illustrates the possible
impact of large-scale PV in transmission and sub-transmission
systems. Section 4 illustrates the generic model of large-scale PV
for stability studies in power system. Section 5 reviews the largescale PV impact on power system stability followed by the grid
code of operation in Section 6. Section 7 illustrates the technical
solutions to overcome the stability challenges associated with
large-scale PV integration. Finally, Section 8 concludes the paper.
2. Current trends and future projections

Wind energy was the only promising renewable resource for
bulk electricity generation until year 2000. From 2000 onwards,
1425
along with wind, solar PV proves itself as one of the promising

resources for bulk power generation due to the technological
advances in semiconductor and power electronics. Fig. 2 compares
the worldwide growth of PV and wind during 19952012. From
Fig. 2 it is evident that from 2010 and onwards, PV experiences a
sharp growth as compared to the wind. In seven years duration,
2004 to 2010, the worldwide total PV capacity has increased with
a per annum average rate of 55%, and reached at 40 GW by the end
of year 2010. Furthermore, in 2011 and 2012, the total of 60 GW of
PV generations has been installed all over the world, ranging from
hundred of kW to several tens of MW [8]. Six more countries have
reached to the installed capacity of 1 GW in 2012, compared to just
three in 2010. This shows a signicant increase in penetration and
interest in PV. The European Photovoltaic Industry Association
(EPIA) predicts that the global capacity of PV could reach more
than 200 GW by 2020 and 800 GW by 2030; hence, a signicant
share of global electricity demand will be met by PV plants [9].
In the initial years of PV installation, most of the installed systems
were standalone type. However, currently, the grid connected
systems are the dominate ones. By the end of 2007, 90% of the
total installed capacities were grid connected.
Power systems in Germany, Italy, Japan, and Spain have some of
the highest PV penetrations in the world. About 75% of the
installed PV systems are in Europe. PV power has been experiencing rapid development in USA in recent years. In USA, most of the
utilities are confronted with high Renewable Portfolio Standards
(RPS). RPS level of 1530% is required in most of the USA states by
2020 [10]. Almost half of this RPS will be achieved by utility-scale
PV generation system [11]. Beyond European Union and USA, the
countries which have signicant PV installation are China, Canada,
India, and Australia. Though Australia is one of the nations with
the highest average per square meter solar radiation in the world,
it is well behind than others in large-scale PV installation [12].
However, the commonwealth government of Australia set an
ambitious target of generating 16% of its electricity demand from
solar by 2050 [13]. This will certainly increase the investment in
large-scale PV installation. It is worth noting that in 2012, a
number of large-scale PV projects of 10 MW and more capacity
has raised at least 12 different countries across Europe, North
America, and Asia [8]. At the end of July 2013, there are 1900
projects with total 60 GW solar generation capacity worldwide, of
which, 630 projects are large-scale PV, capacity ranges from
15 MW to 300 MW, and more [14], indicates the increasing
interest of large-scale PV.
Despite the benet of emission free energy generation from PV,
until 2011 PV faced a major obstacle due to the high capital cost;
Fig. 2. Comparison of PV and wind installed capacity [8].
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Table 2
Capital and O&M cost of renewable generator unit [16].
Renewable generator type
Capital cost
O&M cost
Solar PV unit
Biomass unit
Wind unit
$4004/kV A
$2293/kV A
$1882/kV A
$0.01/kW h
$0.012/kW h
$0.01/kW h
Table 3
Signicant large-scale PV power plants worldwide [17].
Sl. nos.
Location (State, Country)
Size
(MW)
Commissioned
years
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
Longyangxia Dam, Qinghai Province, China

San Luis, CA, USA
Yuma County, USA
Charanka, India
Golmud, China
Meuro, Germany
Sonoran Desert, USA
Neuhardenbers, Germany
Templin, Germany
Toul-Rosires, France
San Luis Obispo, USA
Perovo, Ukraine
Sarnia, Canada
Briest, Germany
320
250
250
214
200
166
150
145
128
115
108
105
97
91
2013
20122013
2012
2012
2011
20112012
20112012
2012
2012
2012
2012
2011
20092010
2010-2011
reected on its cost per kWh of energy production. Table 2 shows

the capital cost of PV installation compared to the two other
common forms of renewable generations in 2009 standard. The
capital cost for PV installation was almost twice as high as the cost
for wind and much higher than that of biomass. However, with the
obligatory carbon price, the electricity generation cost from solar
PV would be cost competitive in many countries around the world.
In 2011, the installation cost of large-scale PV plant has gone down
below the cost of nuclear power plant [15]. The average retail price
for solar cell has dropped down to $2.43/W from the value $3.50/W
in 2010. Moreover, a recent study reveals that the retail price for
large-scale PV installation will be less than $1/W by 2020. Since the
large-scale installations enable the reduction of PV plant cost per
watt of nominal power, it is expected that more large-scale PV
systems, in ten to several hundred MW size with a central point of
interconnection at transmission and/or sub-transmission level, will
be seen to be interconnected into the utility grid in foreseeable
future. Table 3 shows some of the signicant large-scale PV installation worldwide till 2013. From the table it can be seen that from
2011, the size of large-scale PV plant has signicantly increased and
touched the size of 320 MW by the end of 2013. Moreover, a
signicant number of projects of this scale are under construction
in USA, Canada, China, and Spain.
Some of the notable large-scale PV projects under development
are: Topez solar farm (550 MW) and the desert sunlight solar farm
(550 MW) in California, USA [18,19]. A number of large-scale PV
projects are under planning phase, and the lists of those projects
can be found in [14] and the references there in.
3. Grid integration challenges

Despite all the benets of PV, this generation might lead to
some potential negative impact to the grid. The information
gathered from an extensive literature survey reveals the uctuation of PV output power due to the variation of solar irradiance as
one of the major problems for grid integration [20]. In last ten
years, there have been extensive research efforts to identify the

possible adverse effect of PV systems in distribution grids. The
operational problem arises in primary and secondary side of
the distribution system with the high penetrations of PV because
of the structure of the distribution grid which is mainly build to
transfer unidirectional power. Proliferation of PV to the distribution system introduce voltage regulation problem, frequency
regulation, reverse power ow, harmonics, under and over loading
of the feeders, and so on. Many research efforts have been
conducted so far to address the harmonic problem associated
with PV integration [2123]. Research efforts in [2426] have been
devoted to solve the PV induced voltage regulation problem in
distribution grids. There are some signicant studies regarding the
impact of centralized PV on distribution system voltage regulation
and loss reduction [27]. Moreover, research effort in [28]
attempted to investigate and solve the potential controller interaction issues in sub-transmission/distribution system with high
penetrations of PV and wind generations. Many of the above
discussed works effectively identied the potential problems and
solutions associated with PV installation in distribution grids.
However, owing to the advancements in power electronics and
semiconductor technology, and subsequent cost reduction, the
penetrations of PV will no longer be limited to the distribution
systems. Large-scale PV systems in transmission and subtransmission or medium voltage distribution system are no longer
the vivid imagination, rather a reality in future grid. However, the
impact of transmission level PV system on utility did not receive
much attention by the researchers till the beginning of this
decade. The characteristics of PV plants connected at transmission
levels often referred as large-scale or utility-scale PV plant is
substantially different from the conventional power plants such as
nuclear, thermal or hydro. A typical large-scale PV plant is
composed of multiple generators connected to the network
through the power electronic interface. High penetration of PV
in transmission and sub-transmission systems could affect the
steady state and dynamic operations of the entire power system.
Moreover, the problems associated with Large-scale PV systems in
sub-transmission and transmission systems are different compared to the problems in distribution system. For example, sharp
change of PV output due to the moving clouds is one of the major
problems in secondary distribution system. However, in transmission and sub-transmission level PV system, it is minimized by the
natural averaging effect due to the installation of PV plants over
the vast area. A 13.2 MW plant in Nevada exhibits only a 20%
power ramp in 10 s where, a 75% ramp in 10 s is observed by an
irradiance meter [11].
While considering the dynamic behaviour of the system with
high penetrations of PV one of the major concerns is the zero
inertia of PV. Although the competitive interest for large-scale PV
integration has resulted several versions of highly sophisticated
voltage source inverter technology, however, the inertia less
integration of PV continues to impose many limitations and
challenges on grid integration of large-scale PV while using the
conventional form of inverter control. The research work reported
on Transmission system performance analysis for high penetration PV demonstrates the adverse the effect of reduced system
inertia due to high PV penetrations on system angle and frequency
stability [29]. Other challenges associated with large-scale PV are
post fault voltage regulation and voltage stability. Most of the
current practiced standards for PV suggest that PV should operate
within a restricted reactive power operation regime or should not
actively participated on voltage regulation or reactive power
compensation (i.e., IEEE 1547, UL 1741). Lack of reactive power
compensation is the immediate concern for high PV penetration
cases, which could lead to the voltage regulation and instability
problems. Considerable insertion of utility-scale PV in some power
systems such as Germany and Spain proved to have a substantial

impact on power system voltage regulation and stability performance [11]. Research study in Western Electricity Coordinating
Council (WECC) system indicates how the large-scale PV adversely
affect the voltage stability phenomenon of power system [30].
Moreover, the research work reported in [31,32] revealed that the
strict standards for reactive power control in current practice (i.e.,
xed power factor or xed reactive power operation) makes the
active power regulation with consideration to frequency variation
non-trivial as the conventional control becomes ineffective for
710% voltage variation, which makes the voltage and frequency
stabilization more challenging.
Power system economic dispatch is a matured and extensive
eld. However, it is anticipated that with the addition of largescale PV the operational practice will be changed [33,34]. The
research work conducted in a part of WECC system demonstrates
the need for optimal dispatch mechanism with large-scale PV [34].
Research on generation dispatch and spinning reserve commenced
in early 90s [35,36], however, did not get much attention from the
research community due to none existence of such installation
around the world. The works in [35] show how the spinning
reserves requirement; generation mix and maintenance schedules
are affected by the operation of large-scale PV. A ruled based
dispatching algorithm has been proposed in [36] to mitigate the
problem arise due to the uctuation of power in 100 MW PV plant
during dispatching period. A summary and classication of technical impacts of large-scale PV in transmission and subtransmission systems are presented in Fig. 3. The technical impacts
of large-scale PV on transmission and sub-transmission systems
are categorized as generation dispatch, strategic spinning reserve,
and instability problems which is further classied into voltage,
angle and frequency instability issues.
Given this development, transmission system operators around
the world encountered an increasing need of comprehensive grid
code for large-scale PV with particular focus on grid stabilization [37].
The German grid code, Spanish grid code, the newest grid code
published by European Network of Transmission System Operators,
and the task force under the aegis of North American Electric
Reliability Council have made several recommendations for more grid
support functions (such as frequency support, voltage regulation
and so on) in order to alleviate the stability challenges associated
with large-scale PV integration [3841]. As the solo focus of this paper
is to review the research works related to power system stability and
large-scale PV, thereby, in the later part of this paper, the works
related to power system stability challenges associated with largescale PV integration and technical solutions will be discussed in detail.
Before moving to the literature review on large-scale PV
impacts on power system stability, a brief description on the
modelling of large-scale PV for stability studies is presented in the
next section as the accuracy of the stability studies with largescale PV depends totally on the delity of the underlying model of
the PV generator.
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4. Modelling of large-scale PV for stability studies

A numerous PV generator models have been developed and
reported in literatures [4249]. However, there is no industry
standard model for PV generator [42]. Moreover, most of the
developed PV generator models are suitable for power quality studies
in distribution systems which includes detailed modelling of electromagnetic transient behaviour of PV systems [43,44,47]. The detailed
PV modelling for fast transient studies is not necessarily required for
the system wide stability impact studies where the focus is on
electromechanical behaviour of the system. Until recently, a generic
model of PV has been proposed based on the earlier work done by
WECC and CIGRE [45,46]. This model is simple and appropriate for
transmission and sub-transmission level stability studies. In this
model, the converter is considered as a controlled current source
which provides the required current injection to the network. The
brief description of the model is given in next subsections.
4.1. PV array model
A PV cell is the basic building block of PV array which is simply
a pn junction diode that converts the sun light into electricity.
A mathematical description of currentvoltage characteristics of PV
cell is available in literatures [44]. The single exponential function
which models a PV cell is derived from the physics of pn junction
and can be extended to get the array output current as follows

V A I PV RS q
I PV I SCA G N P I 0 exp
1
1
nN S kT
where IPV array current (A), VA array voltage (V), qelectron
charge (1.6 10 19 C), kBoltzmanns constant 1:38 10 19 ,
nideal factor, Ttemperature, I0 reverse saturation current of
diode (A), RS array series resistance (), ISCA (G) NPISC (G), ISC cell
short circuit current (A), G solar insolation (W/m2); NS NCSNSM,
NP NSP, NCS number of series-connected cells in a module, and NSM
and NSP, respectively, represent the number of modules connected in
series and parallel in the PV array. The relationship of cell short
circuit current to the solar insolation can be expressed as
I SC 0:001I SCR kv T T R G
where ISCR cell short circuit current at reference temperature,

kv temperature coefcient, TR reference temperature.
By multiplying the Eq. (1) by VA the power delivered by the
array can be found as follows
P PV I PV V A
Alternatively, the power delivered from PV array can be

expressed by the following approximation formula [50]
P PV Ac I Ac kt T kt T 0
2
where Ac is the array surface area (m2), is the efciency of the PV

panel, T and T 0 are the parameters that depend on inclination,
Fig. 3. Classication of technical impacts of large-scale PV on transmission and sub-transmission grid.
1428
declination, reection of ground, latitude, hour angle, sunset hour

angle, and kt is the hourly clearness index.
Moreover, the dc output power from PV array can be calculated
by a physical model based simulation software PC1D [6]. It is a
commercial PV cell simulator to solve the coupled semiconductor
device equations numerically. The inputs to the model are the cell
parameters, irradiance and temperature.
A number of different solar cells such as monocrystalline,
polycrystalline, thin lms are commercially available for the use
in large-scale PV power plants. Each of these cells have their
unique electrical characteristics reected on their power generation proles. However, irrespective to solar cell technologies, the
power output feed to the power system from large-scale PV
through the point of interconnection (POI) is variable and uncertain in nature. The grid integration challenges are mainly governed
by the uncertainty and variability of PV power output, inverter,
and the controls of the PV plant. Therefore, the grid integration
challenges do not alter with the solar cell technologies used in the
PV power plants.
Fig. 6. Block diagram of grid side converter [45,46].
4.2. PV model for steady state analysis

Although PV generators are distributed within solar farm like
wind farm, the bulk power from the solar farm (large-scale PV
plant) is delivered to the grid through a single substation. Consequently, PV generators within the farm are aggregated into a single
unit, as shown in Fig. 4, having a MVA rating equal to the
summation of the MVA rating of individual units. Furthermore,
as the PV units have reactive power capability, the solar farm could
be modelled similar to the synchronous generator for steady state
analysis, i.e., PV or PQ bus with appropriate MVAr limits [46,48].
4.3. PV model for dynamic analysis
Fig. 7. Reactive power control model [45,46].
Fig. 5 shows the overall structure of utility-scale PV generator

system as reported in [45,46]. From the block description of the
model, it is clear that the fundamental frequency dynamic behaviour of a PV is dominated by converter and associated controls.
Fig. 6 depicted the block diagram of a grid side converter and
control of PV which acts as a buffer in between PV array and grid,
provides required injected current into the network in response to
Fig. 4. A schematic diagram of single generator equivalent unit of PV plant [51].
Fig. 5. Block diagram of standardized utility-scale PV.
the real and reactive power command from electrical control of

the generator. Fig. 6 dictates that the active power to be delivered
to the system is based on the solar power prole (PPV), whereas,
reactive power generation depends on the comparative signal
generated from reactive power control. A more detail model of PV
reactive power control is shown in Fig. 7. As seen in Fig. 7, the
control mode can be switched to either power factor (PF) control
mode or voltage control (VC) mode. Depending on the required
control task, each of this control unit can be activated by selecting
a proper ag.
In voltage control, the specic bus voltage is compared with the
reference voltage to generate an error signal which is feed through
the PI controller to generate Qorder for the supervisory VAr
controller. On the other hand, in power factor control, generated
real power is multiplied with the associated power factor to
generate the corresponding Qorder for the supervisory control.
The voltage controller of PV consists of lter blocks with Tr and
Tc time constants, respectively. The values of the PI controller gains
are usually set higher for better voltage response during the
disturbances. However, as like AVR in synchronous generator,
higher gain in PI controller could increase the risk of instability
in the system.
In Volt/VAr control, the Qcomd signal is compared to the
converter reactive power (Qgen) and the resulting error is multiplied with ki to generate Verr signal. Then, in converter/control, the
Verr is compared to the terminal voltage to generate reactive
current command I qcomd . Depending on the specic stability
consideration, static or dynamic model of PV as described above
could be incorporated in the studies.
5. Impact on power system stability

5.1. Voltage stability
It is believed that due to the distinct characteristics of PV and
current grid regulation, the voltage stability of the system could
signicantly be affected by high PV penetrations. The effect of high
PV penetrations on the voltage magnitude and stability of the
transmission and sub-transmission system are studied in [30,5257].
The research effort in [30] revealed that depending on the penetrations of large-scale PV, the system could experience both benecial
and detrimental effects from the steady state stability point of view.
The authors in [52] analyzed the effect of large-scale PV on static
voltage stability of the Ontario power system with centralized and
distributed PV. The analysis has been done by considering various
penetration levels up to 2000 MW. Their study concluded that
dispersed PV in Ontario system may benecially affect the static
voltage stability of the system. The Ontario utility experienced less
benecial effect in terms of voltage stability margin improvement if
the PVs are central power plant type. In this work, the benecial
effect of PV on voltage stability has been converted into the monetary
benet to the system. From the analysis it is evident that long-run
savings from loadability improvement is higher for the distributed PV
system as compared to the centralized PV with voltage and reactive
power control.
The research effort in [53] attempted to analyse the impact of
PV on system voltage magnitude. Various PV penetration levels
from 0% to 16% have been considered for this analysis. From their
analyses it can be seen that the replacement of synchronous
generators by PV could negatively affect the voltage magnitude
of the system, and the severity of the adverse effect increases with
the higher penetration of PVs. This work has proposed a number of
techniques such as constant power factor control, automatic
inverter voltage control to mitigate the voltage uctuation in a
system with high penetration of PVs. The research effort in [53]
has also devoted to analyse the impact of PV on dynamic voltage
stability of the system. From the study it can be concluded that the
dynamic voltage stability of the system could negatively be
affected with the increased PV penetrations. Authors in [54] have
studied the transient over voltage behaviour at the POI of PV. This
study concluded that the transient over voltage phenomenon
depends on the size of a PV system, placement of SVC, and lack
of having enough synchronous generators in the vicinity of a PV
system. The study showed that the transient over voltage problem
signicantly increases with the size of PV in the system and the
distance of POI from the main grid. From the analysis it can also be
seen that synchronous generator in the vicinity of PV could reduce
the transient over voltage level, whereas, SVC could aggravate the
transient over voltage problem.
Research study in [55] was performed in the California ISO to
assess the voltage and reactive power responses for different types of
PV generator interconnection (i.e., centralized, dispersed, reactive
power control mode). The analysis in this work suggests that high
voltage problems are inevitable in the system due to the high
penetration of PVs at sub-transmission level. Absorbing reactive
power by PV converter or shunt reactor at the POI of PV has proposed
in this work as the possible mitigation measures against the high
voltage caused by the solar PV interconnection. Furthermore, interaction effect of PV reactive power control and other reactive power
devices has been shown in this work. From the analysis it can be seen
that SVC could cause higher transient over voltage problem in the
system with PV as compared to no SVC in the system. This happens
because the slower SVC controller keep injecting reactive power to
the grid for few cycles after the fault clearance.
Shah and others [56] have studied the impact of large-scale PV
on power system voltage stability in sub-transmission system.
1429
Both power factor and voltage control mode operation of centralized and distributed PV have been considered in this work.
Moreover, three VAr planning algorithms were compared in this
work in terms of static voltage stability of the system with largescale PV. Interaction among PV system and SVC and/or STATCOM
has also been assessed in this work. This study concluded that PV
size, locations, and mode of operation have strong impact on the
static voltage performance of sub-transmission system. Both static
and dynamic voltage stability of the system with PV have been
assessed in [57] by PV curve analysis, dynamic simulation, and
eigenvalue sensitivity. This work focused on to nd out the impact
of the system parameters such as temperature, solar irradiance,
and load changes on voltage stability performance of the system.
From the static analysis it can be seen that the system voltage
stability margin could be extended due to the penetration of PV.
Although several transient response results have been presented
in this paper, however, no solid conclusion can be drawn from
the paper.
5.2. Rotor angle stability

5.2.1. Transient stability
A very few research efforts have devoted in revealing the
impact of PV in power system transient stability [29,30,52,58,59].
Research work in [30] has revealed the impact of both utility-scale
and roof-top PV on power system transient stability performance
for a large test system representing the portion of the Western US
interconnection. The Utility-scale and roof-top PV units were
added to the aforementioned test system by replacing a portion
of conventional generators. Various penetration levels up to 50%
were considered in this work. From the simulation results it can be
noticed that at 20% PV penetration level, following the outage of
500 kV transmission line between the faulted bus and the adjacent
bus could have both adverse and benecial effect on the transient
stability performance depending on the fault location and the
duration of the fault. Moreover, from the analysis it is also noticed
that the loss of a major portion of roof-top PVs could lead to
the transient instability problem to the system during high
penetration.
Authors in [52] have analyzed the transient stability performance of Ontario system with large-scale and distributed PV.
Critical clearing time (CCT) index has been used in this work to
evaluate the dynamic stability performance of the system. To
evaluate the transient stability, a sustained 3-phase fault has been
considered at the middle of one of the 500 kV transmission lines
connecting Bruce to Southwest zone near Torento region for the
fault duration of 80 ms. From the result it can be noticed that for a
voltage and reactive power control enabled centralized PV, system
does not experience a considerable dynamic stability behavioural
change. However, for the distributed PVs, the system transient
stability performance certainly improves with the increment of PV
penetration levels.
Achilles et al. [29] have performed the transmission system
performance analysis with high PV penetration on IEEE-39 bus
test system for various cases. The analyses have been conducted
for various control congurations such as the distributed PV
compliant to IEEE 1547, PV with LVRT and frequency control,
voltage control, and so on. Various penetration levels in terms of
the percentage of load (up to 60%) have been considered in this
work. The analysis results acknowledged the unit commitment
strategy as a key factor by which the system transient stability
performance can be affected. Moreover, from the anaysis it can be
seen that a substantial PV penetrations compliant to IEEE 1547
could add additional risk of transient instability with extensive
loss of PV units during transmission fault.
1430
In Ref. [58], the impact of large-scale PV and its LVRT capability

on transient performance was assessed on a 3 machines 9 bus
system and IEEJ West-10 machine test system. Various penetration
levels starting from 5% up to 30% have been considered in this
work. The following two LVRT characteristics of PV as shown in
Fig. 8 have been used in this work. From the analyses it can be
seen that system experienced better transient stability performance with LVRT enabled PV systems. However, beyond 10%
penetrations, system could experience an adverse effect on transient stability performance.
Yagami and others [59] have analyzed the impact of PV on
power system transient stability by using single machine innite
bus system. Various output capacities of synchronous generator
(500900 MV A) following the change of PV outputs have been
considered in this analysis. A kinetic energy based transient
stability assessment index has been used to pin point the effect
of PV on system transient stability. From the analysis it can be
concluded that during high PV penetration, the lower system
inertia and higher generator reactance could lead to the detrimental transient stability performance of the system.
5.2.2. Small signal stability
Recently, there is an increasing interest to analyse the impact
large-scale PV on power system small signal stability [52,6069].
Although the mechanical dynamics of PV system are completely
decoupled from the power grid, however, there are primarily four
mechanisms by which PV can affect the critical modes of the
system [67,69]:
M1. Redispatching synchronous machine with and without
PSS, thereby affecting the mode.
M2. Impacting the major path ow thereby affecting the
electromagnetic torque of the system.
M3. Dispatching the synchronous generator with PSS.
M4. PV controller interacting with the damping torque.
Research effort in [60] advocates how the increased PV penetrations could inuence local electromechanical (EM) modes of the
system. Impact of PV on power system small signal stability
analysis has been assessed here in a single machine innite bus
system. Average switching model of voltage source converter and
boost converter has been used in this analysis. It has been
identied that the controller parameters of PV has profound
impact on the damping of the local modes of the system. The
improper tunning of PV control parameters may deteriorate the
damping of the local modes.
The work in [61] depicts that the large-scale PV tends to
increase the damping of local EM modes. Moreover, the control
mode associated with the synchronous generator exciter system is
Fig. 8. PV LVRT characteristics [58].
also positively inuenced with PV integration. However, this work

has used the user dened simplied model of PV generator to
assess the impact of PV on power system electromechanical and
control modes. Nonetheless, the change of power generation from
slack bus has been considered in this work, thereby, the impact of
change in power ow by PV to the system oscillation mode has
been investigated.
The research in [62] was devoted in revealing the impact of PV
generator on power system small signal stability. The analyses
were conducted for various disturbances such as change in
irradiance, temperature, load, and system conguration. This study
revealed that the damping of the electromechanical mode
increased with the inclusion of PV to the system. Both negative
and positive impacts of PV penetrations on local oscillation mode
have been reported in [63]. Modal behaviour of the power system
has been assessed by using a single machine innite bus system.
Novel damping torque analysis (DTA) method has been used to
assess the modal behaviour of the system. From the analyses it can
be seen that if 70% and more of the demand are supplied by PV
then it may negatively affect the damping of the local mode.
In Ref. [64], the impact of high PV penetrations on power
system small signal stability was assessed for a two-area system by
modal analysis and time domain simulation. PV generator was
considered to be operated at the xed power factor (unity power
factor) for this analysis. From the analyses it is revealed that the
mode shape of the inter-are modes for the synchronous generators
(that are not displaced by the PV) are affected signicantly. From
this work, it also worthwhile to note that the PV system could
have both benecial and detrimental impact on power system
small signal stability depending on the size, location, and penetration levels. This research work suggests to keep the critical
generator online to overcome the adverse effect of PV on modal
behaviour of the system.
The work in [65] was devoted to analysis the impact of real and
reactive power modulation of a converter control generator in
power system inter-area mode damping. The analysis has been
conducted in a simple system with two synchronous generators
connected by an AC transmission line. From the results it can be
concluded that both real and reactive power modulation of the
converter control generator are effective to improve the damping
of the inter-area mode. However, real power modulation is better
when converter control generator is connected at the end of the
transmission line joining the two AC sources whilst reactive power
modulation is better when injection point is close to the mid point.
Moreover, it is found that the combine controls of real and reactive
power modulation could provide better damping to the interarea mode irrespective to the location of the converter control
generator.
Research effort in [66], has investigated the impact of largescale PV in a stressed 16 machine 68 bus test system. To address
the inuence of PV and synchronous generators physical difference on power system oscillation, the analysis has been conducted
by using PV and synchronous PV of same rating to PV at the PV
locations. Synchronous PV is referred here as the synchronous
generator of equivalent size to PV with excitation system. The
analysis revealed that the integration of large-scale PV into the
system creates the higher angular separation among the existing
synchronous generations as compared to synchronous PV, resulting poor damping of inter-area mode. Eftekharnejad et al. [67]
have assessed the impact of large-scale PV on small signal stability
both by modal analysis and time domain simulation in a large
power system. Both roof-top and utility-scale PV have been
considered for this analysis. Roof-top PVs were aggregated at
the sub-transmission voltage level of 69 kV. From the analyses
presented in [67], a signicant reduction of critical mode damping
has been seen for 30% to 40% PV penetrations. The eigenvalue
1431
Table 4
Summary of research on large-scale PV impact on power system small signal stability.
Reference
Inuence
Mechanism by which affect the critical mode
[6063]
[64,65]
[64,66,67]
[52]
[68]
[69]
Can enhance the damping of local and some control mode

Can enhance the damping of the inter-area mode
Can decrease the damping of inter-area mode
No signicant impact on the damping of critical mode
System control parameters have a signicant impact on damping
Can decrease the damping of inter-area mode, two new types of low-frequency modes associated
with converter control
M2
M2
M13
M1
M4
M4
sensitivity analysis with respect to inertia pinpointed the fact that

the eigenvalues are detrimentally impacted with the reduction of
the system inertia. The research effort in [68] investigated the
impact of two-stage multistring grid connected centralized PV on
power system small signal stability. For this analysis PV system has
been assumed to be located remotely and connected to the subtransmission system through a series compensated double circuit
transmission line. The analysis revealed that a remotely connected
PV could adversely be affected by the transmission circuit used to
connect the generator, on particular, the series compensated line.
The series compensated line has a noteworthy impact on the
stability of the control loop of PV plant. Moreover, the small signal
analysis revealed that the gain parameters of the PV controller
have a signicant impact on the damping of a dominant mode.
The impact of large-scale PV on the Ontario power system
small signal stability was assessed in [52]. Three different types of
PV namely distributed unit, centralized unit with and without
voltage control have been considered to assess the impact of PV in
power system small signal stability. This analysis has considered
different levels of penetration up to 2000 MW. From the analysis it
can be seen that the damping of the individual eigenvalue does
not change signicantly. A detailed studies on inverter based
generations impact on small signal stability are presented in [69].
This work has emphasized to explore the forth mechanism by
which PV and other converter control generators affect the small
signal stability of the system. Three test cases for the year of 2010,
2020, and 2022 of Western Coordinating Council were used for this
analysis. It has been identied from the simulations that there is
relatively low interaction between converter control generators and
synchronous generators in inter-area modes. Generally, reactive
power control gain and voltage control integral gain are participating in the interaction. This research work has also identied two
new types of low-frequency modes associated with converter
control generators and some of which have very poor damping.
Between two newly emerging modes, one is exclusively dominated
by converter control generators and the other is originated due to
the interaction between synchronous generators and converter
control generators in the system. Convergent researches on largescale PV impact on power system small signal stability are summarized in Table 4.
5.3. Frequency stability
With the high PV penetrations, a signicant number of synchronous generators in the system would be replaced and resulting in reduced system inertia. With the high penetrations of zero
inertia generators like PV, the conventional generators that
co-existing with these generators will be forced to provide torque
and inertia to mitigate any instability events, that could lead to the
frequency instability problem. The incident in ERCOT system on
Feb. 26, 2008 is an excellent example of such a situation [70],
where the unexpected loss of some synchronous generators with
wind generator ramp down and load ramp-up led to a decline in

system frequency. It is believed that high penetration of zero
inertia generators like PV with higher ramp rate could adversely
affect the frequency stability of the system. The research work in
[71] depicts the effect of PV penetration on frequency stability of the
system. Three different levels of penetrations (5%, 10%, and 20%)
were considered in this work. However, in this work the conventional units were not replaced by PV. The analysis has been done by
considering the rapid variation in power injection caused by several
factor such as change in irradiance, temperature and tripping out of
the grid connected converter. From the analysis it is evident that at
20% PV penetration levels, system experienced frequency instability
problem. However, as the conventional units were not replaced by
PV, the solid conclusion due to the system inertia reduction and PV
impact cannot be drawn from this analysis. A frequency stability
analysis of a two area system with real time simulation model of a
large-scale PV, 200 MW (4 50 MW) has been presented in [72].
Automatic generation control scheme has been used in the analysis
to allow the maximum penetration of PV and to adjust the
synchronous generator outputs. From real time simulation, the
authors have concluded that the increased penetration of PV has a
positive inuence on frequency stability. However, like [71], the
conventional generator units were not physically replaced in this
study as well.
6. Grid code of operation

It is evident that the large-scale renewable generation (i.e.,
wind and PV) would be comparable to the conventional generators
in coming decades for bulk power generation [73]. Large-scale PV
systems must have to fulll certain grid connection requirements,
usually known as grid code, for secure and reliable supply of
electric power. This section of the paper presents a comprehensive
study on the latest grid code regulation to be enforced by the
transmission operators on large-scale PV. Comprehensive literature review of the existing grid code revealed that there is an
inadequate sets of rules for large-scale PV [74]. Initially, PV
systems were built as a small distributed generation on rooftop,
connected to the secondary side of the distribution systems.
Therefore, instead of transmission system grid code, distribution
system grid code, IEEE Std. 1547-2003 was adopted rst [75],
which prevailing the standard for PV plant of 10 MV A aggregated
capacity or less at low voltage distribution system. Only the recent
German code, Spanish code, and the code released by European
Network for Transmission System Operators have a full guidelines
for large-scale PV integration to the transmission and subtransmission or medium voltage distribution systems [3840,76].
The FREC Order 661A has recently been modied to incorporate
the grid integration issues of large-scale PV [77]. Nonetheless,
transmission system operators in China, Italy have initiated the
separate rules for large-scale PV, but still in draft form Ref. [76].
1432
A review of the technical reports on grid code requirement

shows that the technical requirement enforced on a large-scale PV
can be broadly classied as reactive power control, voltage
regulations, and dynamic requirements.
6.1. Reactive power support and voltage regulation
Fig. 9 shows the capability curve of PV generation system.
In the gure, solid line represents the capability curve for the rated
operation whereas, the dotted line represents the reactive power
capability with over sized inverter. This gure also depicted the
operational characteristics for xed power factor (70.90) envelop.
The large-scale PV inverter can provide reactive power at full
active power or partial output. As it can be seen from the gure,
the reactive power capability would be higher at lower active
power level. To get the inverter based reactive power at full power
involves the over sizing of the inverter, so that, it can handle the
full rated real and reactive current. In order to get the range of
70.95 power factor at the POI entirely from PV, PV operator has to
increase the inverter rating as much as 10% considering all reactive
power losses in the PV system. The equivalent representation of PV
reactive power capability depends on the cumulative reactive
power range of the inverters. As for example, a large-scale PV
system has a nameplate rating of 23.1 MV A (21 1.1 MV A) and
inverters are considered to be participated in steady state voltage
control, then the equivalent generator modelled with 70.95
power factor has a corresponding setting of Qmin and Qmax of
6.9 MV Ar and 6.9 MV Ar, respectively. If the PV system are
anticipated to operate at xed power factor level then the
subsequent reactive power output need to be adjusted accordingly
based on the power output and inverter reactive capability.
According to German grid code, PV plants should be capable of
providing reactive power at the POI within the boundary of 7 0.95
power factor for medium voltage (MV) grid. For high voltage grid
connection bandwidth for reactive power operation should be
within 0.90/ 0.95 power factor range [38]. In FERC LGIA, the
reactive power requirement for large-scale PV is not well-dened.
Often, 7 0.95 power factor range is in use [80]. According to
ERCOT, the required power factor range for a large-scale PV is
70.95 for maximum power output. However, for partial power
output, reactive power range should be scaled by the ratio of
active power to the rated power. Meanwhile, according to the
Fig. 9. Real and reactive power characteristics of PV [78,79].
Table 5
Power factor/reactive power requirement.
Country of origin/
regulatory body
Power factor requirement
Germany
FERC
ERCOT
Medium voltage 70.95; high voltage 0.90/ 0.95

70.95 Power factor
/ 0.95 Power factor for full output, scaled by the
ratio of active power for lower output
70.95 Power factor for real power generation 4 20%
CAISO
Fig. 10. Fault ride through capability [38].
proposed CAISO grid code, all the variable generators including

large-scale PV should operate at 70.95 power factor range at POI
when they are exporting 4 20% of rated power [81]. Table 5
summarized the power factor/reactive power requirement at the
POI of large-scale PV proposed by different transmission system
operators (TSOs).
6.2. Dynamic regulation requirement
In addition to steady state regulation, some dynamic regulations are also required for grid integration of large-scale PV, and,
these dynamic regulation requirements are usually known as
disturbance tolerance requirement. One of such requirements is
fault ride through (FRT) requirement or low voltage ride through
(LVRT). In German grid code (Jan. 2011), PV generations should
have the capability to participate in dynamic grid support during
the disturbances (faults) in the system. LVRT requirement proposed in German grid code is shown in Fig. 10.
According to this grid code, PV systems should not be disconnected from the system in case of voltage dip down to 0 for a
time period less than 150 ms [38]. Spanish grid code has the
similar LVRT requirements as German grid code [39]. Moreover,
the Spanish grid code has two future recommendation functions:
Inertia emulation, and power oscillation damping. FERC LVRT
requirements are often used for a large-scale PV. According to
FERC requirement, PV generator should withstand the 0 voltage at
POI for up to 0.15 s or 9 cycles [80] for 60 Hz systems. In recent
years, grid codes of some countries like Spain, Denmark, and
Australia have enforced demanding voltagetime proles for
voltage swell conditions, normally known as high voltage ride
through (HVRT). As illustrated in [54,,55], system could experience
transient over voltage problem during high PV penetration scenarios. Therefore, the grid codes for large-scale PV may also
require clear guidelines for HVRT.
In addition to LVRT capability, German grid code has proposed
an active power reduction requirement. According to this, active
power should be reduced for the frequency more than 50.2 Hz, and
Table 6
WECC ONF requirement for generator [80].
Under frequency limit (Hz)
Over frequency limit (Hz)
Minimum time
459.4
o 59.4
o 58.4
o 57.8
o 57.3
o 57.0
6060.6
4 60.6
4 61.6
4 61.7
N/A
3 min
30 s
7.5 s
45 Cycles
Instantaneous
return to the nominal value when frequency is below 50.05 Hz [38].

Other European countries such Scotland, Ireland, and Denmark have
released specic grid codes for renewable generations. However, these
directives are mostly suitable for wind and other renewable generations. There are no specic regulations & codes for PV generation
systems [82].
Moreover, according to FERC LGIA regulation, large-scale PV
generator connector should meet the existing WECC ONF. Detail of
the WECC ONF is given in Table 6.
7. Technical solutions
A signicant number of works has been conducted to alleviate
the technical constraints related to the PV penetration in distribution systems such as voltage regulation, active power curtailment,
coordinated voltage control, and so on (see [8385], and the
references therein). Recently, several research efforts have been
directed to lighten the technical constraints related to large-scale
PV integration in transmission and sub-transmission system [86].
In this section of the paper, the technical solutions related to largescale PV and power system stability issues are presented.
Work has been conducted by First Solar to design a grid
friendly large-scale PV with capability of voltage regulation,
voltage and frequency ride through, active and reactive power
control, and frequency response criteria [87]. A typical plant level
logic and control loop scheme with real time commands has been
used to achieve the fast and reliable regulation so that it behaves
as a single machine. The commands in the controller is provided
through SCADA and human machine interface.
7.1. Frequency regulation
As illustrated earlier, the fast penetration of large-scale PV
forced the grid integrator to inherit some of frequency support
features of synchronous generator in PV such as inertial response,
primary and secondary frequency control, and the provision of
minimum supply of active power reserves. The research work
in [88] investigated the impact of PV system inertial response on
IEEE 12 bus network by real time simulation. To consider the
realistic system operating conditions, automatic generation control (AGC) has been considered. A droop based frequency control
method has been implemented in the studied PV system. The
analysis results revealed that the frequency support service in PV
improved the frequency stability of the system. In Ref. [89], a
method of limiting the power ramps of PV plants due to the
changes in solar irradiance without energy storage has been
presented. The main idea of the method is to yield the PV power
lower than the maximum power point and operate it with a
dynamic reserve. The dynamic reserve control has been achieved
by adding a lag control block in active power controller of the
inverter. Work in [90], proposed a droop based frequency control
method for PV by active power curtailment without energy storage.
The proposed strategy is comprised of two different modes:
(a) primary frequency support, and (b) emergency frequency
1433
support. The analysis results revealed that with the proposed

control method, PV can provide primary frequency support similar
to the synchronous generator. Moreover, in case of severe disturbance, it can switch to the emergency mode of frequency support to
mitigate the frequency overshoot. Within the framework of frequency support and regulation, there are other two approaches:
(a) integration of energy storage device to alleviate the frequency
regulation problem [9193], and (b) use of dump loads to absorb
excess energy in order to regulate the frequency of the system.
Detail about these practices can be found in [9193] and the
references therein.
7.2. Low frequency oscillation damping
There are a number of research works devoted in designing
damping controller in PV for enhancing the damping performance
of the system [9497]. A control scheme for large-scale PV based
on structure preserving energy function model has proposed
in [94] to improve the small signal stability performance of the
system. The novelty of the proposed control law is that it used only
the locally available measured signals independent to the location.
Moreover, the control scheme does not affect the maximum power
point tracking of the PV plant. The performance of the controller
has been veried both by simulation and practical experiment.
Shah and others [95] have proposed a minimax-LQG based widearea damping controller in PV for inter-area oscillation damping.
Reactive power modulation technique has been used here for
oscillation damping. In this control synthesis method, the robustness of the controller is achieved through the optimization of the
worst case scenario of the underlying system subject to the
integral quadratic constraints on the admissible uncertainty.
In Ref. [96], authors have proposed a novel feedback signal
selection technique for wide-area POD in PV. For a robust norm
bounded LQG based wide-area damping controller design, the
variability and uncertainty of the system are conned by system
matrices which are afne function belong to the polytopic region.
The performance of the proposed controller has been tested in 16
machine 68 bus system for a wide range of system operating
conditions. It establishes that the proposed controller is superior
compare to the controller designed by conventional signal selection
method. Dahal and others [97] have proposed a methodology to
control the power factor of the PV to enhance the damping of the
critical mode. A simple local signal based lead-lag feedback controller
has been proposed in this paper to control the reference reactive
current of the PV inverter, thereby, to control the power factor of the
PV to enhance the damping performance of the system.
Even though the proposed damping controllers in [9497] are
robust and effective, however, yet to be available in PV and wind
systems sold by the manufacturer at present. Therefore, a robust
reactive power control of large-scale wind and PV has been
proposed in [98] to enhance the damping of the inter-area mode.
The article proposed a methodology to utilize the wind and PV
reactive power capability in such a way that the power system
could operate in low-frequency secure manner for a wide-range of
system operating conditions. The control action proposed in this
paper consists of setting different reactive controls at the selected
sources (renewables) based on their inuences on low-frequency
oscillation. The proposed reactive power management is based on
the theoretical view of structured singular value (SSV) method.
Convergent researches on low frequency oscillation damping
support from large-scale PV are summarized in Table 7.
7.3. Voltage regulation
Ref. [99] has proposed a novel control technique for large-scale
centralized PV to incorporate the attributes of AVR and governor to
1434
Table 7
Summary of research on large-scale PV for low frequency oscillation damping.
Research on low frequency oscillation damping
Reference
Damping controller for PV to enhance the damping of EM modes

Robust wide-area damping controller in PV for low-frequency
oscillation damping
Robust reactive power control of large-scale wind and PV for
oscillation damping
[9497]
[95,96]
[98]
perform like a conventional unit. The proposed method allows

precise active power control strategy corresponding to the
dynamics of frequency droop characteristics to share the load
and control bus frequency under certain conditions. This method
also realizes the AVR action so as to regulate the bus voltage by
reactive power control. An online supervisory voltage control
(OSVC) for grid interfaced large-scale PV has been proposed for
the dynamic voltage support of the grid [100]. The proposed
control algorithm evaluates the voltages of all the grid buses to
determine the optimal regulation margin corresponding to system
status in terms of over excited and under excited operation of PV.
The OSVC scheme has a reactive current allocation algorithm
which is adaptive to real-time system status corresponding to PV
plant and grid bus voltage proles. Mirhosseni and others [101]
have proposed a modication in large-scale PV system for reactive
power support in the medium voltage (MV) grid. They have
modied the reactive power support capability of PV to make it
compatible for grid support. The modication has been made to
operate PV at xed reactive power mode, xed power factor mode,
and droop control mode. A control scheme for grid connected
PV is developed in [76] to provide grid support and control
during steady state and transient in compliance to the Spanish
grid code P.O. 12.2. A dq mechanism based control algorithm has
been developed to control DC bus voltage, active power, and
injection and absorption of reactive power. The proposed algorithm has been tested in PSAD/EMTP simulation environment and
in eld of a real PV system. From both eld test and simulation it is
evident that the PV system with proposed control remained
connected to the grid after being subjected to different disturbances. An optimal control strategy for a large-scale PV in
compliance to grid code proposed by German Association of
Energy and Water Industries has been developed in [32] for a grid
stabilization. The proposed control implementation method does
not required any hardware modication in a conventional current
control scheme. Both simulation and experimental results
conducted by 100 kW PV demonstrated the effectiveness of the
control method.
7.4. Fault-ride through

A signicant number of works are devoted to incorporate FRT
capability in large-scale PV so that it does not trip off during
system disturbances. The positive and negative sequence control
approach and PV characteristics have been used in [102] to
enhance the FRT capability of large-scale PV. The performance of
the controller has been tested in 3.3 MW PV plant connected to a
test system comprise of 2.4 MW self- excited induction generator
and a 0.9 MW diesel generator. Islam et al. [103,104], have
proposed a novel control method to improve the FRT capability
of large-scale PV in a MV network. The detailed fault analyses in
[103,104] have revealed the effectiveness of such controller in
large-scale PV. A non-linear feedback controller has been proposed
in [105] to ensure the current levels are constraints to an allowable
level to support the FRT function of PV. A coordinated control

scheme based on large-scale two-stage PV has been proposed in
[106] to support FRT function by maintaining the inverter DC-link
voltage. The work in [107] designed a LQG controller for
D-STATCOM to ensure the grid code compatible LVRT performance
of a PV generator. The proposed controller has been designed
based on the H 1 of the uncertain system. The performance of the
design controller has been tested in a medium voltage distribution
system with composite load model. It establishes that the
D-STATCOM with the proposed controller is robust enough to
ensure the grid compatible operation of a PV.
There are other sets of research studies which have been
devoted to modify the converter control of large-scale PV in such
a way that it can operate as a static synchronous compensator
(STATCOM) in night-time to prevent any voltage regulation or
instability issues in the system [108111].
8. Conclusions
Recent price reduction has greatly increased the number and
size of large-scale PV plant around the world. A large-scale PV
plant has now reached to the parity in many electricity markets.
It is expected that the large-scale PV will produce electricity at the
same price and lower than the conventional generations in
foreseeable future. No doubt that the large-scale PV is the
promising electricity generation source due to its clean and
environmental friendly features, however, have a number of
negative effects on power system, on particular, the stability of
the system. From the reviewed literature it is evident that high PV
penetrations on system is impacted by a continuum of factors. The
size, location of PV, type of PV resources (distributed and centralized), availability of adequate reserve in the system, dispatching and displace of conventional generators by PV, reactive power
compensation method, and control loops of PV are among the
factors severely affect the impact of PV penetration on system
behaviour. From this paper it is apparent that to increase the
penetrations of large-scale PV in the future power systems, it is
important to overcome the bottlenecks corresponding to voltage,
frequency and angle stability and develop necessary standards to
facilitate the integration.
A number of grid recommendations (grid codes) have been put
forward by different transmission system operators for the awless integration of large-scale PV in transmission and/or subtransmission level. These regulations are varied substantially from
one system operator to others and not sufciently clear, technically and economically justied. This could impose additional cost
on PV equipments manufacturers and plant developers. Thereby, a
global harmonization of grid codes is sought for large-scale PV
which would assist the manufacturers to develop a market
oriented universal PV plant equipments.
Furthermore, a signicant works have been devoted to overcome the stability constraints associated with large-scale PV in
power system. According to the work reviewed in this paper, most
of the works only focused to solve one stability constraints for
integration rather than a unied approach to look at all the
stability constraints.
According to the works reviewed in this paper, most of the
large-scale PV based works are along the line of stability issues
and the associated control of PV generators for secure and reliable
operation of the system. However, it is believed that dispatching
strategy and spinning reserve would be equally important issues
as stability in future power system with high penetrations of largescale PV. Therefore, more work need to be done along this
direction.
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Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

A review of key power system stability challenges for

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

the North-West of Australia. It is believed that the establishment

Fig. 1. World solar energy map [4].

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

in large-scale PV in transmission and sub-transmission systems has

2. Current trends and future projections

along with wind, solar PV proves itself as one of the promising

Fig. 2. Comparison of PV and wind installed capacity [8].

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

Location (State, Country)

Longyangxia Dam, Qinghai Province, China

reected on its cost per kWh of energy production. Table 2 shows

3. Grid integration challenges

years, there have been extensive research efforts to identify the

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

systems such as Germany and Spain proved to have a substantial

4. Modelling of large-scale PV for stability studies

where ISCR cell short circuit current at reference temperature,

Alternatively, the power delivered from PV array can be

where Ac is the array surface area (m2), is the efciency of the PV

Fig. 3. Classication of technical impacts of large-scale PV on transmission and sub-transmission grid.

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

declination, reection of ground, latitude, hour angle, sunset hour

Fig. 6. Block diagram of grid side converter [45,46].

4.2. PV model for steady state analysis

Fig. 5 shows the overall structure of utility-scale PV generator

Fig. 4. A schematic diagram of single generator equivalent unit of PV plant [51].

Fig. 5. Block diagram of standardized utility-scale PV.

the real and reactive power command from electrical control of

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

5. Impact on power system stability

5.2. Rotor angle stability

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

In Ref. [58], the impact of large-scale PV and its LVRT capability

Fig. 8. PV LVRT characteristics [58].

also positively inuenced with PV integration. However, this work

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

Mechanism by which affect the critical mode

Can enhance the damping of local and some control mode

sensitivity analysis with respect to inertia pinpointed the fact that

wind generator ramp down and load ramp-up led to a decline in

6. Grid code of operation

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

A review of the technical reports on grid code requirement

Fig. 9. Real and reactive power characteristics of PV [78,79].

Power factor requirement

Medium voltage 70.95; high voltage 0.90/ 0.95

Fig. 10. Fault ride through capability [38].

proposed CAISO grid code, all the variable generators including

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

Over frequency limit (Hz)

return to the nominal value when frequency is below 50.05 Hz [38].

support. The analysis results revealed that with the proposed

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436

Damping controller for PV to enhance the damping of EM modes

perform like a conventional unit. The proposed method allows

7.4. Fault-ride through

level to support the FRT function of PV. A coordinated control

R. Shah et al. / Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 41 (2015) 14231436