HVDC Technology and Smart Grid

Smart Grid is much more than IT and smart meters. A SmartGrid is an electricity network that can intelligently integrate the actions of all users connected to it – generators, consumers and those that do both – in order to efficiently deliver sustainable, economic and secure electricity. This article first gives a background to HVDC Transmission Technology in general, and secondly describes how HVDC Transmission Systems can be implemented in the network and used as backbones to establish strong and fully controllable transmission links, and thereby strengthening and increasing the reliability and availability of the electrical transmission system. The article gives examples of how different types of HVDC transmission systems today is used to transmit large amounts of power over long distances, as interconnections between asynchronous ac networks including sea crossings, and for evacuation of large scale offshore wind-generated power.