Generating RSCAD FX Models for Real-Time EMT-Simulation using Component Graphs and PyAPI-RTS

The transition of the power grid, driven by the increasing penetration of renewable energy sources and inverter-based resources, necessitates real-time EMT simulations for accurate system representation and stability assessment. However, migrating models to RSCAD FX, the modeling software of RTDS real-time simulators, is non-trivial, and existing solutions are often inflexible. The RSCAD FX version 2.4 has introduced a Python API for controlling simulations and modifying models via program code. However, the API requires manual placement of each electrical and control component individually to determine the correct connectivity of the model elements. In this paper, we introduce an updated version of the PyAPI-RTS open-source software that is now capable of interacting with the official RSCAD Python API and generating or importing models from connectivity information without the need to place the elements manually. To do so, we introduce a novel component graph data structure and a layout algorithm that are described in this paper. The approach is then applied to a small demonstration model and a larger real world use case.