By 2020, several areas of the HVAC pan-European transmission system will be operated with extremely high penetrations of Power Electronics(PE)-interfaced generators, thus becoming the only generating units for some periods of the day or of the year – due to renewable (wind, solar) electricity. This will result in i) growing dynamic stability issues for the power system (possibly a new major barrier against future renewable penetration), ii) the necessity to upgrade existing protection schemes and iii) measures to mitigate the resulting degradation of power quality due to harmonics propagation. European TSOs from Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain and UK have joined to address such challenges with manufacturers (Alstom, Enercon, Schneider Electric) and universities/research centres. They propose innovative solutions to progressively adjust the HVAC system operations. Firstly, a replicable methodology is developed for appraising the distance of any EU 28 control zone to instability due to PE proliferation and for monitoring it in real time, along with a portfolio of incremental improvements of existing technologies (the tuning of controllers, a pilot test of wide-area control techniques and the upgrading of protection devices with impacts on the present grid codes). Next, innovative power system control laws are designed to cope with the lack of synchronous machines. Numerical simulations and laboratory tests deliver promising control solutions together with recommendations for new PE grid connection rules and the development of a novel protection technology and mitigation of the foreseen power quality disturbances. Technology and economic impacts of such innovations are quantified together with barriers to be overcome in order to recommend future deployment scenarios. Dissemination activities support the deployment schemes of the project outputs based on knowledge sharing among targeted stakeholders at EC level.

Six TSOs, eleven research partners, together with sixteen industry (manufacturers, solution providers) and market (producers, ESCo) players address, through a holistic approach, the identification and development of flexibilities required to enable the Energy Transition to high share of renewables. This approach captures synergies across needs and sources of flexibilities, such as multiple services from one source, or hybridizing sources, thus resulting in a cost-efficient power system. OSMOSE proposes four TSO-led demonstrations (RTE, REE, TERNA and ELES) aiming at increasing the techno-economic potential of a wide range of flexibility solutions and covering several applications, i.e.: synchronisation of large power systems by multiservice hybrid storage; multiple services provided by the coordinated control of different storage and FACTS devices; multiple services provided by grid devices, large demand-response and RES generation coordinated in a smart management system; cross-border sharing of flexibility sources through a near real-time cross-border energy market. The demonstrations are coordinated with and supported by simulation-based studies which aim (i) to forecast the economically optimal mix of flexibility solutions in long-term energy scenarios (2030 and 2050) and (ii) to build recommendations for improvements of the existing market mechanisms and regulatory frameworks, thus enabling the reliable and sustainable development of flexibility assets by market players in coordination with regulated players. Interoperability and improved TSO/DSO interactions are addressed so as to ease the scaling up and replication of the flexibility solutions. A database is built for the sharing of real-life techno-economic performances of electrochemical storage devices. Activities are planned to prepare a strategy for the exploitation and dissemination of the project’s results, with specific messages for each category of stakeholders of the electricity system.