Supergrid Information
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Variants for the Supergrid
One idea substantially promoted by the company Airtricity is for an undersea Supergrid. The advantages of this approach are the avoidance of major planning issues that any new system of land based distribution would incur. Originally conceived because of the substantial resources of offshore windpower a wider Undersea Grid is also a future possibility.
Delays due to argument and politics have enormous potential to inhibit the rapid deployment of this technology - so solutions such as this despite immediately greater costs should be examined with care. In combination with this, Airtricity are advocating a 10 GW "foundation project " between England, Germany and the Netherlands - whereby some 2,000 wind tubines generate electricity which is distributed view the DC network across Europe. Clearly substantial investment is needed and it is understood negotiations continue.
Relevant links include
Airtricity
Leonardo Energy - excellent paper regarding conceptual 10 MW based North Sea Grid and associated problems.
compared to
HVDC based on Voltage Source Converters is an emerging technology. It has many advantages over the present system and some disadvantages.
The two major European "Players" are ABB and Siemens whose names for this technology are "HVDC Light" and "HVDC Plus" respectively. Links to descriptions are ABB and Siemens. The Siemens site lists the advantages and disadvantages in a grid form.
The SmartGrid is generally used to denote an AC Grid which has added intelligence to cope with the demanding need for rapid adjustments to power outputs. Super smartGrid is a term generally used to denote the etireity of the hoped for SuperGrid in conjunction with an existing, uprated AC Grid (ie the SmartGrid).