Abstract
Electric power systems are experiencing relevant changes involving the growing penetration of distributed generation and energy storage systems, the introduction of electric vehicles, the management of responsive loads, the proposals for new energy markets and so on. Such an evolution is pushing a paradigm shift that is one of the most important challenges in power network design: the management must move from traditional planning and manual intervention to full “smartization” of medium and low voltage networks. Peculiarities and criticalities of future power distribution networks originate from the complexity of the system which includes both the physical aspects of electric networks and the cyber aspects, like data elaboration, feature extraction, communication, supervision and control; only fully integrated advanced monitoring systems can foster this transition towards network automation. The design and development of such future networks require distinct kinds of expertise in the industrial and information engineering fields. In this context, this paper provides a comprehensive review of current challenges and multidisciplinary interactions in the development of smart distribution networks. The aim of this paper is to discuss, in an integrated and organized manner, the state of the art while focusing on the need for interaction between different disciplines and highlighting how innovative and future-proof outcomes of both research and practice can only emerge from a coordinated design of all the layers in the smart distribution network architecture.
Highlights
The paper has presented the challenges in the design, development and operation of the future electric distribution networks, which must become “smart” in order to tackle the issues posed by the massive introduction of renewable energy sources (RES)
Various scenarios for SDN development are possible, the most promising ones have been emphasized in the paper (MG, virtual power plants (VPP) and energy hubs (EHs)); among these EH seems the most suitable because it requires the deep integration of different hybrid energy vectors
In this regard further investigation will be need in order to assess its implementation within SDN; The SDN must rely on an accurate and efficient monitoring system and on a reliable communication system
Summary
Referring to the last five years, RES investments have been at least $200 billion per year, $265 billion in 2016 [3] These huge investments led to an overall share of Energies 2018, 11, 2530; doi:10.3390/en11102530 www.mdpi.com/journal/energies. Energies 2018, 11, 2530 the global energy consumption supplied by RES of about 19% in 2015 and an overall share of electricity production coming from RES of about 25% in 2016 [3]; some studies foresee that the share of global energy consumption coming from RES will achieve about 80% in 2050 [3,4] Such a huge distributed generation (DG), is affected by poor programmability and significant power fluctuations caused by high sensitivity to environmental conditions.
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