Electric power

About: Electric power is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 73036 publications have been published within this topic receiving 636991 citations.

Are Microgrids the Future of Energy?: DC Microgrids from Concept to Demonstration to Deployment

Abstract: Microgrids are defined as groups of energy resources, both renewable and/or conventional, and loads located and interconnected in a specific physical area that appear as a single entity to the alternating-current (ac) electric grid. The use of distributed resources to power local loads combined with the capability to operate independently of the ac grid makes microgrids a technically feasible option to address the concerns of sustainability, resilience, and energy efficiency. Furthermore, microgrids can operate while completely separated from the grid, representing a lower-cost option to provide electrical power to regions in developing countries where conventional ac grids are not available or are too unreliable. When connected to the ac grid, microgrids appear as controlled entities within the power system that, instead of being a burden to the ac grid power-management system, represent a resource capable of supporting the grid. Energy storage as the element responsible for balancing generation with load is critical to the success of the microgrid concept, and it is more important as larger penetration of renewable resources is present in the microgrid. Accelerated improvements in performance and cost of energy-storage technologies during the last five years are making microgrids an economically viable option for power systems in the very near future (see Figure 1).

Deregulating and regulatory reform in the U.S. electric power sector

Abstract: Citable URI: http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/44967 Other Contributors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research. Advisor: Publisher: MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research Date Issued: 2000 Abstract: This paper discusses the evolution of wholesale and retail competition in the U.S electricity sector and associated industry restructuring and regulatory reforms. It begins with a discussion of the industry structure and regulatory framework that characterized the U.S. electric power industry during most of the 20th century and reviews the initial efforts to open the electricity industry to competitive suppliers of generating services during the 1980s and early 1990s. The economic and political pressures that emerged in the early 1990s for more fundamental reforms are discussed, including the stranded cost issue and its resolution. The architecture of the basic reform model that supports both wholesale and retail competition in the supply of generation services adopted by a number of pioneer states is developed. Recent trends in generation divestiture, mergers between electric utilities, and between electric and gas pipeline and distribution companies, and entry of unregulated merchant generating plants are then reviewed. The new institutional arrangements necessary to govern access to and the operations of electric transmission networks to support competition among competing decentralized generators of electricity are examined. Transmission pricing, market organization, congestion management and market power issues are included in this analysis.(cont.) The structure and performance of California's competitive electricity markets are discussed in detail as an example of the applications of these principles and the challenges that electricity sector restructuring must confront. Early experience with retail competition in California, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania is reviewed. The paper concludes with an initial assessment of the benefits and costs of electricity sector restructuring to date in the U.S. and some thoughts regarding future challenges and trends. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/44967 Other Identifiers: 2000-003 Series/Report no.: MIT-CEEPR (Series) ; 00-003WP.

Electric Power Systems

Abstract: The electric power system is one of the largest and most complex infrastructures and it is critical to the operation of society and other infrastructures. The power system is undergoing deep changes which result in new monitoring and control challenges in its own operation, and in unprecedented coupling with other infrastructures, in particular communications and the other energy grids. This Chapter provides an overview of this transformation, starting from the primary causes through the technical challenges, and some perspective solutions.