How to Manage the Complexity of the Grid?

Abstract

Power industry is facing revolutionary changes. The direction of the US Government to low carbon footprint and, as a consequence, high penetration of renewable energy resources and smart grid technologies are completely transforming planning and operational patterns for electric grid. As more and more variable and demand response resources being integrated into the electric grid, the grid operation is experiencing increasing level of uncertainties. The decision-making process under such environment becomes more challenging. The grid architecture and control also become more and more decentralized requiring new control paradigms and reliability metrics to be investigated in order to achieve much higher level of flexibility and resilience. These changes are disruptive enough to cause even transformations in utility business dealing with completely unknown situations. On the other hand, the evolution in computing; generation, transmission, and distribution technologies; and mathematical methods creates opportunities for innovation in power system design and control. New mathematical models for power system analysis and operation are being developed to address above challenges. We will discuss the need for new power system control and electricity market design directions while managing grid complexity.