Trade-Offs in Modelling Accuracy and Complexity of DC Circuit Breakers: A Comparative Aggregated Approach

The growing interest in high-voltage direct current (HVDC) technology and multi-terminal HVDCs (MTDCs) has motivated the evaluation of DC circuit breakers (DCCBs) for increased operational flexibility. While modeling DCCBs remains essential, their complex structures and modeling techniques require careful consideration. In this context, trade-offs in modeling accuracy and complexity of DCCBs are of paramount importance, and hence, benchmarking-based modeling methodology for hybrid and non-hybrid DCCBs is performed in this study. To this end, the performance of different aggregated DCCB technologies, namely hybrid DCCBs, simple DCCBs, and voltage-source DCCBs, is benchmarked for MTDC applications, with the full representation of hybrid DCCBs taken as the baseline for comparison. First, it is shown that the aggregated hybrid DCCB provides an accurate representation of the full hybrid DCCB’s performance. This is followed by an analysis of the parameters for the simple DCCB and voltage-source DCCB (VSCB) that enable their performance to closely match that of the aggregated hybrid DCCB. Finally, the impact of aggregated DCCB models on voltage transients within a test system is analyzed, demonstrating the effectiveness of aggregated modeling across different DCCB technologies. Simulation-based analyses are conducted in PSCAD/EMTDC to compare the performance of different aggregated DCCB models.