Adaptive Load Shedding Strategies for Power System Stability
Summary
With the increasing integration of variable renewable energy sources and the resulting reduction in system inertia, modern power networks face heightened frequency and voltage stability risks. Adaptive load shedding strategies have emerged as a crucial last line of defence to arrest frequency excursions and prevent cascading failures. These strategies dynamically determine which loads to disconnect, how much load to shed and when, based on real-time system conditions. Centralised schemes leverage wide-area measurement systems and phasor measurement units to inform multi-stage or hierarchical shedding decisions, while decentralised schemes empower local controllers or agents distributed across the grid. Advanced optimisation techniques, including evolutionary algorithms, fuzzy logic and chaos-based meta-heuristics, refine shedding algorithms to minimise total disconnected load and maintain both frequency and voltage margins. By incorporating metrics such as rate-of-change-of-frequency and transient energy functions, adaptive schemes adjust activation thresholds and prioritise critical loads, delivering improved frequency nadir, reduced frequency overshoot and enhanced resilience in high-renewable or islanded networks.
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Adaptive Load Shedding Strategies for Power System Stability publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in adaptive load shedding strategies for power system stability across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Under-frequency load shedding (UFLS): Automatic disconnection of predetermined loads when system frequency falls below a set threshold to arrest frequency decline.
Rate-of-change-of-frequency (RoCoF): The gradient of frequency variation over time, used to trigger rapid protection mechanisms.
Transient energy function (TEF): A stability metric combining kinetic and potential energy terms to evaluate system response following disturbances.
Voltage stability margin (VSM): The measure of how close a power system is to voltage collapse under load variations.
Phasor measurement unit (PMU): A device providing synchronised real-time measurements of electrical quantities across the network.
Inertia: Stored kinetic energy in rotating machines that dampens frequency fluctuations after disturbances.
References
- Hierarchical under frequency load shedding scheme for inter-connected power systems. Protection and Control of Modern Power Systems (2023).
- Wide-Area Measurement System-Based Optimal Multi-Stage Under-Frequency Load-Shedding in Interconnected Smart Power Systems Using Evolutionary Computing Techniques. Applied Sciences (2019).
- Underfrequency Load Shedding: An Innovative Algorithm Based on Fuzzy Logic. Energies (2020).
- Chaotic slime mould optimization algorithm for optimal load-shedding in distribution system. Ain Shams Engineering Journal (2022).
- A Frequency and Voltage Stability-Based Load Shedding Technique for Low Inertia Power Systems. IEEE Access (2021).
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