North Sea Wind Power Hub pre-FEED study: DC Protection Functional Requirements and Parameter Ranges for HVDC Building Blocks

Abstract

The North Sea Wind Power Hub (NSWPH) consortium proposed a methodology to define functional requirements and parameter ranges for HVDC building blocks such as converters and switching stations based on Simplistic Test Benchmarks (STB). A STB is composed of several elementary models of DC grid components assembled to build a test environment which, through a set of dedicated dimensioning scenarios, will define functional requirements and parameter ranges for the HVDC building blocks. This paper describes the process of development of the STB to define functional requirements and parameter ranges related to DC grid protection for a four-feeder offshore hub. The main reason for the STB development is to provide a generic pre-design of parameter ranges for the DC grid protection of the four-feeder hub independent from the surrounding DC grid. The methodology considers relevant converter blocking constraints as well as primary and backup protection scenarios. In this context component models with reduced complexity adapted to the needs for this study are introduced. The proposed STBs allows on the one hand to reduce simulation time for parametric study and on the other hand to reduce the models to the elements of impact for DC grid protection design. Results show possible combinations of DCCB operating times, current breaking capabilities and DC reactor sizing with respect to converter blocking constraints for a four-feeder hub and spoke concept.

Pascal Torwelle, Ahmed Zama, ; Bertinato, Alberto; Van Doorn, Joris; Kryezi, Fitim

Presented at CIGRE B4-Colloquium Vienna 2023