The Biggest Grid Success Story of India

On 5th April, 2020, India witnessed an unprecedented event- The Third Largest Power Grid in the Planet underwent a huge shortage and subsequent surge in power- and came out of it successfully.

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In the process, we scripted history- for no other nation has ever planned such a large scale task over such an extensive geographic landscape, and come out of it unscathed.

As everyone knows, as per PM Modi’s request, India was to switch off lights, at 9 pm 5 April

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As soon as the announcement was made, POSOCO- The Power System Operation Corporation, which manages load distribution, (How much current will flow through which segment) did an expert system study, and came up with a proposal on how to handle the huge power disturbance.

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From the power data of a week ago, POSOCO estimated that there would be about 12–13 GW of load released sharp at 9 pm, which would subsequently return to the system at 9:09 pm.

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13 GW of power is huge! To give an idea, SIngapore has a Total Installed Power Capacity of 13 GW. So, to stop generating this much power would need precise and timely action.

The other problem is with frequency.

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You see, when load is increased on a generator, it starts spinning slower (like a fan would rotate slower if something heavy is hung from it). Thus, throwing off a Singapore worth of load would certainly lead the nationwide generators to spin like mad, right?

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Which is why the thermal generators were brought to a minimum right before 9 pm, and hydro & gas generation plants were kept at peak. Thermal plant is relatively more difficult to vary compared to hydro and gas.

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However, when the power started to dip, it was seen that the amount of dip was much more than what was estimated.

As can be seen, the dip was for around 30 GW! This is the Total installed capacity of Pakistan.

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This is also the total installed capacity of Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal, and Afghanistan, COMBINED!

However, the system had been primed so that frequency won’t increase even in the case of higher dip.

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This was maintained by controlling the reactive power generated and consumed in the system. It required simulations, calculations, and a coordinated operation by Every Single Generating Plant all over the country.

As you can see, the frequency varied for only about 1.5 Hz

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This is what makes this whole evening truly Grand. It is simply Amazing that a country as large as India could work as a single Power Unit, responding to the demand changes so beautifully.

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Every Generating station was time synchronized, each operation had to be done exactly at a specific time, and the whole thing had to be managed overall.

And that was the way it was done. Not one mistake, not even a local blackout.

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This thread is a copy paste of a Quora answer.
Not a lot of people are on Quora and this was a curious topic so I shared.

For the original: https://www.quora.com/Can-the-diya-jalao-light-bujhao-decision-taken-by-PM-Modi-lead-to-a-potential-power-grid-crisis/answer/Rajarshi-11?ch=10&share=52febbf8&srid=S7RJ

Writer works at PowerGrid corporation of India limited

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