Recent and prospective developments in power system control centers: Adapting the digital twin technology for application in power system control centers

Abstract

The development of power system control centers has always been linked to the evolving of new technologies and innovative concepts. Switching to IP/TCP-based communication was one mayor evolutionary step in the past. Now, new precise time-synchronized phasor measurement units (PMU) based monitoring tools are on the rise and enable dynamic system observation. Future control centers for power systems can profit from this development, enlarging the observability and rising operator situation awareness. The next evolutionary step in control center technology may be the utilization of the Digital Twin concept. Its abilities to depict the actual and possible future system state, makes it an inevitable solution for further improvement of power system monitoring and control systems. This paper discusses recent developments of control center technology and introduces a new concept of a Digital Twin centric control center architecture which is based on a dynamic simulation engine called dynamic digital mirror.