Technical and Economical Merits of Power Systems Interconnection

This work aims at exploring the effects of the interconnection between isolated electric power systems upon some important aspects such as enhancing reliability levels along with reducing installation and operation costs. To discern the advantages associated with this study, the developed methodology has been applied to three existing power systems in the northern region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia presently within the concession domain of the Saudi Electric Company (SEC). These systems have been established to meet the present loads and to withstand future electrical demands for a period of time before additional generation and transmission reinforcements are needed. In this work, reliability measures have been utilized to determine the period that these systems can fulfill the present and future loads without affecting the reliability levels and the threshold that an additional capacity should be added to maintain those required reliability levels. In application to the reliability criteria, technical, operational and economic advantages can be realized, i.e., higher reliability levels and lower installation and operation costs after the proposed interconnection between these selected isolated power systems take place.