The Need for Additional Inertia in the European Power System until 2050 and the Contribution of Wind Power

In future years, a considerable share of conventional power plants in the European power system is expected to be replaced by solar and wind power, which may require additional inertia support for frequency control. Motivated by that, this paper quantifies the need for inertia in the future European power system until 2050. This paper also investigates the potential role of wind power as a provider of that by emulated inertia. The European power system of the EU-28 countries has been clustered to the four synchronous grids, UCTE, Nordic, UK and Baltic. A total of twelve different scenarios, developed by others, are considered, regarding the future energy mix in the EU. For each of these scenarios the worst case is examined. Production units are dispatched according to their sustainability which is coherent with the minimum natural contribution of inertia, in descending order. The available power output for all types of production is equal to the corresponding installed capacities, while a sudden disconnection of the largest production unit of the dispatched types is considered. Simulation results show that in most cases there will be a need for additional inertia and wind power could fully cover the additional inertia requirement up to 66.4% on the UCTE grid and for 98.3%, 92.4% and 99.1% on the Nordic, UK and Baltic grids, respectively.