Texas Loads Ride Toward Grid Stability: Voltage Ride Through of Large Power Electronic Loads

ERCOT, the independent system operator (ISO) for the Texas region, USA, continuously assesses the reliability of its grid. With the increase of large loads interconnecting to the electric grid, including large data centers and crypto mining centers, maintaining grid reliability can become more challenging depending on the size of the load, its geographical location, its ramping controls, and network conditions. Further, a load’s lack of voltage ride-through (VRT) capability or frequency ride-through (FRT) capability could degrade system reliability. Additionally, these loads could introduce new vulnerabilities to sub-synchronous oscillations (SSO) or sub-synchronous control interactions (SSCI). This article will review realistic critical scenarios that require planning or operation level studies to assess reliability. These assessments will consider VRT and FRT tests with updated models, evaluations of large load on regions with known stability constraints, system impact of co-located load with generation, SSO/SSCI vulnerabilities and other similar reliability challenges.