Inverter-Based Resources and the 2022 Odessa Disturbance: How Solar, Batteries, and Wind Challenge the Texas Grid

In this episode of Practical Engineering, Grady explains how a small fault at a Texas power plant in 2022 led to a sudden loss of 5% of Texas demand and a frequency dip, highlighting the unique challenges inverter-based resources pose for grid stability. The video outlines how solar, wind, and batteries differ from conventional plants and what engineers are doing to keep the grid reliable as renewables grow.

Introduction to the Odessa Disturbance

The video centers on a 2022 incident near Odessa, Texas, where a minor equipment fault at a power plant triggered a larger grid disturbance. Within seconds, Texas lost about 2.5 gigawatts of generation, roughly 5% of demand, with solar plants contributing a significant portion of the drop. The frequency dipped to 59.7 hertz, and the event almost triggered the grid’s protection criteria, underscoring how even small faults can cascade under certain conditions.

Grady uses this event to illustrate a broader point: the grid has historically relied on large thermal plants with inertia to ride through disturbances. The growing share of inverter-based resources, such as solar, wind, and batteries, behaves differently, especially during disturbances when the grid is not at its normal operating point.

What Are Inverter-Based Resources?

Inverter-based resources convert DC to AC before feeding the grid. Solar panels and batteries are DC sources, and wind turbines often produce variable-speed AC that is converted to grid-compatible AC. Grid integration requires grid-following or grid-forming inverters that synchronize with the grid’s phase and frequency and control voltage and current to the grid. The video emphasizes how these devices differ from traditional spinning generators that provide inertia and automatic frequency response.

Dynamics of Frequency and Inertia

The accounting of grid inertia is crucial: large thermal plants act as flywheels, storing kinetic energy that slows the frequency decline after a disturbance. In grids with high inverter-based penetration, there is less physical inertia, making the system more sensitive to generation losses. The rate of change of frequency (ROCOF) and the nadir (the lowest frequency point during a disturbance) determine how quickly backup power must be injected and whether load shedding is required.

Protection, Ride-Through and Market Implications

The Odessa case highlights a tension between protecting equipment and maintaining reliability during faults. Inverter-based resources require ride-through capabilities so they do not trip offline during disturbances, which would worsen cascading outages. The video points out that reliability and stability markets must balance keeping devices protected with ensuring continued support to the grid when disturbances occur. As renewables rise, grid operators are pushing for inverters to provide synthetic inertia and rapid frequency support, while manufacturers continue to develop different protective settings and algorithms.

Key Technical Concepts for A Renewables-Heavy Grid

• Grid-following vs grid-forming inverters: the former sync to an existing grid, the latter can form and sustain a grid island or microgrid.
• Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT): maximizes the power drawn from solar panels by adjusting operating points, a function often integrated with separate MPPT controllers.
• Inertia and synthetic inertia: physical inertia from spinning turbines vs artificial inertia from inverter controls that mimic that response.
• Primary frequency response: automatic actions by generators to arrest frequency decline, critical for stability after a disturbance.
• Protection and fault ride-through: ensuring faults do not trigger widespread shutdowns while protecting equipment.

Implications for the Grid Going Forward

The Odessa disturbance demonstrates that the A share of solar and other inverter-based resources on the grid is rising globally, not just in Texas. The engineering challenges include maintaining inertia, ensuring fast and reliable frequency response, and designing protective schemes that do not overreact to minor faults. The video argues for grid-forming inverters, synthetic inertia, and appropriate market incentives to keep sufficient reserves available while allowing renewables to grow. The presenter frames these challenges as opportunities, noting that modern inverters can respond quickly and provide capabilities such as grid islanding and blackstart support when properly configured.

Conclusion

The episode closes with a message about the ongoing evolution of the grid, a call for collaboration across the industry to resolve these engineering challenges, and Grady’s personal enthusiasm for making complex topics accessible through demonstrations. The Odessa event serves as a case study in the broader transition toward a reliable, sustainable, and resilient energy system.