National Grid ESO has awarded contracts to maximise renewable generation and deliver consumer savings worth millions of pounds.
The deals will see 10 companies with 15 generating units, including wind farms and battery storage, to respond in 150 milliseconds to support system conditions when a network fault occurs.
They will be connected to constraint management equipment to maximise renewable generation on the system and reduce constraint costs across the key B6 English/Scottish border.
Initial estimates suggest savings of £20m to £40m could be delivered by the service.
The contracts are part of the ESO’s Constraints Management Pathfinder project and will enable renewable generation to continue on the system, rather than being pre-emptively curtailed.
Instead of paying constraint costs to turn off generation when there is the risk of a fault, this technology provides an option of allowing generation to continue for longer.
This results in reduced constraint costs which would ultimately be paid for by consumers.
National Grid ESO Julian Leslie said: “These services give our control room more flexibility, enabling renewable generation to stay on the system for longer and taking us another step closer to 100% zero carbon operation.
“They’re part of the ESO’s wide-ranging 5-point plan which will allow us to manage constraints on the system more effectively in the years ahead, reduce balancing costs and ultimately save consumers millions of pounds.”
Pathfinder projects are designed to find new ways of the operating the system to reduce costs for consumers.
This service is an innovative way of managing the risk of very rare network faults, National Grid ESO said.
Currently, the main mechanism to constrain generation is to bid generators off the system.
This approach is used by system operators around the world, but it can be expensive as it is done prior to a fault occurring.
This project, which procured 1.7GW of transmission connected generation, will see up to 800MW available to be tripped off at any one time.
When the ESO identifies a constraint on the B6 boundary, the generation is armed to be ready to reduce output in the event of a fault.
This approach avoids constraining off the generation pre-emptively as is currently the case.
Should a fault occur, the generating units respond quickly, reducing their output within 150 milliseconds.
The ESO will then reconnect the units to the system as quickly and safely as possible.