After a review of state-of-the-art distribution and transmission systems, the influence of distributed generation on the infrastructure of distribution systems will be discussed. An introduction of symmetrical components and associated short-circuit calculations provide tools for the assessment of systems with distributed generation. The renewable energy sources will be connected to the utility system at low voltage levels, where the system impedance is relatively large. This results in unfavorable transient interaction between the intermittently operating renewable-energy plant with the utility system.

The available renewable sources such as photovoltaic arrays with their required load matching, peak-power tracking, shadowing effects, and wind power generation with constant and variable-speed generators will lead to the combination of solar and wind power plants with pump-storage/compressed-air facilities. The fact that wind power plants can change their power output relatively quickly (e.g., 60MW per minute as reported by a New Mexico wind farm) and compressed-air power plants have a start-up time of 6 minutes calls for bridging power sources such as either super capacitors, batteries or fly-wheel storage plants. These are necessary to provide power between the time when the wind power plant is unable to deliver power and the time the compressed-air power plant can replace the power generated by the wind power plant. The principle of the Stirling engine, geothermal and solar-heat power plants concludes the renewable energy section. The ability to store electric energy will be an important feature of future system with intermittent distributed generation. The merits of batteries, super capacitors, fuel cells, magnetic storage, compressed hydrogen, pump-storage plants, and compressed-air plants will be examined.

Next, conventional energy sources will be reviewed, and improved conventional energy sources such as circulating fluidized-bed combustion, integrated coal-gasification combined cycle, carbon capture and sequestration, and Nox/sulfur/CO2 filtering/ scrubbing will be addressed.

The management of loads and their control is an important issue of the power system of the future due to the intermittent operation of renewable energy sources. Linear and nonlinear loads will be analyzed, strategies for load shedding devised, the use of control via power line carriers and BPL (broad band power communication) investigated. Optimal control of power factor and harmonics using fuzzy and genetic approaches will lead to effective filters within a distribution network.

The course concludes with the discussion of on-line measuring methods and components as applied to a utility system. Reliability indices will be used to enhance the overall performance of the electric power system.

1. Structure of Electric Power System
2. Transmission and Distribution Systems
3. Sources of Energy
• Conventional Sources
• Improved Conventional Sources
• Renewable Sources
4. Storage of Electricity
5. Loads and Their Control
6. Measurement Techniques

Required

1. Grainger and Stevenson Jr, Power System Analysis, McGraw-Hill, 1994.
2. Wood and Wollenberg, Power Generation Operation & Control John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1984.
3. Tester et al., Sustainable Energy -Choosing Among Options, The MIT Press, 2005.
4. Hughes, Energy 101, Dakota Alpha Press, 2004.
5. Decher, Energy Conversion - Systems, Flow Physics and Engineering, Oxford University Press, 1994.
6. O'Hayre et al., Fuel Cell Fundamentals, John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, NJ, 2005.
7. Yen and Langari, Fuzzy Logic: Intelligence, Control, and Information, 1st ed., Prentice Hall, 1998.
8. Goldberg, Genetic Algorithms in Search, Optimization, and Machine Learning, Addison-Wesley Professional, 1989.
9. Fuchs, Electromechanical Systems, Class Notes for ECEN 3170, 2004.