A Comparative Study on Equal Area Criterion Based Methods for Transient Stability Assessment in Power Systems

Assessment of rotor angle transient stability is a common routine for planning and operation of the power system. Hence, many efforts have been made continuously in developing the transient stability assessment (TSA) tools. Compared with the time domain simulations (TDS), hybrid methods which integrate the advantages of both TDS and direct methods also contributes to a great deal in TSA application. This paper reviews two such equal area criterion-based direct methods namely, single machine equivalent (SIME) approach, and individual machine equal area criterion-based (IMEAC) in the context of power system TSA. Both the methods are reviewed and compared systematically in the aspects of their assessment capabilities and computational complexities. The result of this study shows that both methods suit well for TSA application but IMEAC based approach has got more potential than the SIME approach for stability assessment in large-scale power systems.