🤔 Reflection: When There’s No One Left to Follow

Just finished listening to the Energy Insiders podcast episode “State of Inertia and Potential for Grid-Forming Inverters”, where Dean Sharafi (AEMO WA) unpacks the crucial role of inertia and the emerging importance of grid-forming inverters.

Key Takeaways

• Grid-following inverters rely on a stable voltage reference. As synchronous machines retire, this reference weakens — threatening the stability of the entire grid.

• Grid-forming inverters can establish their own voltage and frequency. They don’t need an external reference, making them essential in high-renewable, inverter-dominated systems.

• Synthetic inertia — especially from batteries — can respond in milliseconds, and has been shown to be up to 8× more effective than traditional rotating machines.

• Inertia is disappearing not just from generation, but from loads too. As induction motors are replaced with inverter-based technologies, we’re losing ‘load inertia’ as well.

• With lower system inertia, disturbances escalate faster. This increases the risk of cascading generator trips, Distributed Energy Resources (DER) disconnections, and potentially widespread blackouts.

“We know even 100% renewables is achievable. The challenge is how to get there safely without putting the system at risk.”
— Dean Sharafi

🎧 Source: “State of Inertia and Potential for Grid-Forming Inverters” — Energy Insiders podcast (RenewEconomy)