Integrated Power Grid

an electric power system formed as a result of the integration of several individual power grids. The individual member systems retain their separate administrations, but their operations are supervised by a single control center. The exchange of electric energy between the individual grids is carried out using transmission lines that operate at voltages from 220 to 800 kilovolts (kV). In the USSR these lines operate at from 220 to 750 kV. Electric power networks operating at 35 to 220 kV are used as distribution networks within the individual power systems.

The first integrated power grid in the USSR was created from the Sverdlovsk, Perm’ and Cheliabinsk power systems in 1942–43. Integrated power grids in operation by the end of 1965 included the Central, Southern, Ural, North Kazakhstan, and Far East systems. By 1973, after the hydroelectric power plants (including the Bratsk and Krasnoiarsk plants) on the Enisei and Angara rivers were put into operation, the Central Siberian Integrated Power Grid had become the largest in the country. It includes the Irkutsk, Krasnoiarsk, Kuznetsk Basin, Novosibirsk, Tomsk, Omsk, and Barnaul electric power systems. As of 1972, the total power rating of all power stations of the Central Siberian grid exceeded 22 gigavolts. The Siberian grid includes more than 4,000 km of 400 kV lines, about 6,000 km of 220 kV lines, and 15,000 km of 110 kV lines.

The integration of power grids and the creation of a single control center (the unified control center, or ODU) is a most important step in providing a single, integrated electric power system for the entire USSR.