Unveiling the Potential of Shadow Capacity Analysis for Enhancing Power Grid Loadability: Towards Future Applications

The recently articulated concept of “Median Shadow Capacity” has provided valuable insights into the topological factors that impact the loading capacity of a power grid when subjected to (
$N-1$
) security constraints. One significant insight gained from this novel concept is that the imbalances within the reactance structure of a power grid may lead to unbalanced power redistribution after an outage, resulting in overloading somewhere within the grid, and thus, the violation of (
$N-1$
) security constraints. Consequently, it appears that modifying the reactance structure of a power grid would enhance its loadability. Analyzing the median shadow capacities suggests certain lines within the grids, referred to as “constraining lines”, are responsible for limiting the loadability of other lines. This is typically due to imbalances between these lines' and other lines' impedances. Therefore, the proposed approach of this paper entails introducing fixed reactances to the constraining lines to modify the grids' reactance structures as a potential means of improving the grids' loadability. The proposed approach is tested using a sample grid, and the grid's loadability is explored by conducting a feasibility analysis for a variety of operational scenarios generated by Monte Carlo simulations. This analysis reveals that modifying the impedances of the constraining lines can improve the loadability of the grid under (
$N-1$
) security constraints.