Smart Grid Energy Storage UHV Power Station

Where does UHV power come from?

One waypoint on that journey is this ultrahigh-voltage (UHV) converter station outside the city of Jiuquan, in Gansu province. Electricity from the region’s wind turbines, solar farms, and coal-fired power plants arrives at the station as alternating current.

Why is China building a UHV power grid?

State Grid is also building a world-leading set of ultrahigh-voltage AC lines, to help eastern China’s regional AC grids absorb the output from those massive lines. “The UHV AC power grid is like a deep-water port, and the UHV DC is like a 10,000-ton ship.

How many UHV lines has State Grid completed?

In January 2009, State Grid energized its first UHV demonstration line—a 650-km, 1,000-kV UHV AC transmission line that linked the North China and Central China regional grids. Ten years on, State Grid has completed 19 of 30 proposed UHV lines.

What is a UHV converter station?

Today the corridor carries a distinctly modern commodity: gigawatts of electricity destined for the megacities of eastern China. One waypoint on that journey is this ultrahigh-voltage (UHV) converter station outside the city of Jiuquan, in Gansu province.

What is a thyristor based UHV converter?

Thyristor-based UHV converters consume what’s known as reactive power—found in AC systems in which the current and voltage are out of phase. (By contrast, active, or real, power is the power that’s actually consumed by the grid’s loads; its current and voltage waves are aligned.)

Why is UHV AC so important?

UHV AC helps distribute the imported electricity. Meanwhile, power authorities everywhere are watching. Gregory Reed, a DC transmission expert who runs the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Energy, says China’s UHV grid puts it far ahead of the rest of the world.