Interpreted Petri Nets Applied to Autonomous Components within Electric Power Systems

In this article, interpreted Petri nets are applied to the area of power and energy systems. These kinds of nets, equipped with input and output signals for communication with the environment, have so far proved to be useful in the specification of control systems and cyber-physical systems (in particular, the control part), but they have not been used in power systems themselves. Here, interpreted Petri nets are applied to the specification of autonomous parts within power and energy systems. An electric energy storage (EES) system is presented as an application system for the provision of a system service for stabilizing the power of renewable energy sources (RES) or highly variable loads. The control algorithm for the EES is formally written as an interpreted Petri net, allowing it to benefit from existing analysis and verification methods. In particular, essential properties of such specifications can be checked, including, e.g., liveness, safety, reversibility, and determinism. This enables early detection of possible structural errors. The results indicate that interpreted Petri nets can be successfully used to model and analyze autonomous control components within power energy systems.