Powering Europe - European Wind Energy Association

Summary
scenario, TradeWind estimates a yearly reduction
of €1,500 million in the total operational costs of
power generation as a result of targeted upgrade of
interconnection.
Grid development benefits all producers and consumers
and, consequently, its costs and benefits should
be socialised.
There is a range of methods to be implemented in
the short term in order to optimise the utilisation of
the existing infrastructure and transmission corridors,
meaning the European transmission capacity can be
swiftly improved in order to uptake the fast growing
wind power installed capacity, maintaining high level
of system security. Dynamic line rating and rewiring
with high-temperature conductors offer the possibility
to significantly increase the transmission corridors’
available capacity. A range of power flow technologies
(FACTS) and improved operational strategies are suitable
immediate options to further optimise the utilisation
of the existing network.
Transnational offshore grids should be constructed to
access the huge European offshore resource. The economic
value of an offshore grid in Northern Europe
justifies investments in the order of €20-30 billion up
to 2030 not only to tap into the potential offshore,
but also to increase cross-border trading in Europe.
A step by step approach is recommended, starting
from TSOs’ existing plans and gradually moving to a
meshed network. The TYNDP must play a crucial role
here by providing a long-term planning vision for European
grid infrastructure.
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Demonstration projects connecting offshore wind
farms to two or three countries should be built to test
concepts and to develop optimal technical and regulatory
solutions. The consequences for the onshore grid
in terms of reinforcement in the coastal zones should
be considered at an early stage. Accelerated development
and standardisation of transmission technology,
more specifically multi-terminal HVDC VSC is necessary
in order to achieve a timely deployment. Neither
the proper regulatory framework, nor the legal conditions
and incentives that could encourage initiatives
in multistate transmission are in place. They must be
developed in a joint effort by Member States, the European
Commission, European energy regulators, TSOs
and the relevant stakeholders.
Taking into account future very high shares of wind
power and other renewable generation in general, the
entire transmission and distribution system has to be
designed and operated as an integrated, flexible unit, in
order to optimally manage the distributed generation together
with a more responsive demand side. Innovative
and effective measures need to be deployed, such as
‘smart grids’, also termed ‘active networks’, ‘intelligent
grids’ or ‘intelligent networks’, and assisted with monitoring
and control methods that allow high concentrations
of variable generation to be managed, especially
at distribution level. An important research task for the
future is the investigation of the use of controlled, dynamic
loads to contribute to network services such as
frequency response.
Powering Europe: wind energy and the electricity grid