Protection challenges on integration of renewable energy sources to power system network: A review

Abstract

The demand for electricity to meet the 21st century requirement is increasing exponentially. This excessive demand is also forcing to increase the electricity generation limits. A huge amount of electrical energy is required to meet demands like EV charging, mobile communication networks, LED lights, non-linear loads etc. To meet this hunger for energy, renewable energy sources are being integrated with the existing grid. This integration of renewable energy with the grid extends from small scale integration to very large-scale integration. This integration results in smart grid technology with various new features like digitization, two-way communication, distributed generation, self-monitoring, self-mitigating and fully controllable compared to conventional grid. Although smart grid technology has various disadvantages over conventional grids, integration of renewable sources with the conventional grid has made the power system very complex. The smart grid has various protection challenges which are not present in conventional grid. This paper gives an insight of different protection issues which occur because of integration of renewable energy sources in the power system network at transmission, distribution, and Microgrid level. Along with these protection issues, some of the mitigating techniques are also elaborated in this article.