Advancing Clean Energy Transition:

The role of Distribution Grid and DC solutions for the Modernization

At the 16th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM16) in Busan, Republic of Korea, ISGAN will host a side event titled “The Role of Distribution Grids and DC Solutions for Modernisation.”

This special session will be co-hosted with Korea’s national utility, KEPCO (Korea Electric Power Corporation), highlighting collaborative approaches to advancing modern power systems and accelerating the clean energy transition.

This side event will provide high-level policymakers, regulators, and private sector leaders with critical insights into the important role and necessary evolution of distribution grids, and how DC technology can help accelerate clean energy deployment and drive power sector transformation.

More specifically, this side event will:

• Bring together high-level policymakers, regulators, private sector leaders, and international experts to explore how DC distribution can support the clean energy transition and modernize power systems.
• Feature presentations from private sector leaders and academic experts, sharing strategies, policies, and case studies that highlight the deployment and benefits of DC distribution.
• Provide a platform for knowledge exchange, fostering dialogue between policymakers and industry leaders. The discussion will highlight the role of DC distribution in industry decarbonisation, improved energy efficiency, and meeting the rising demand for digital energy applications.
• Offer participants insights into best practices and opportunities for international cooperation, in direct support of CEM16’s priorities on Industry Decarbonisation and Power Sector Transformation.

Join us to explore the key topics that will be discussed during the event, and stay tuned for highlights from the session.

The 11th Annual ISGAN Awards Ceremony & 2025 CEM H2I & IEA Hydrogen TCP Awards of Excellence 

This year, ISGAN and the Hydrogen TCP will jointly host their awards ceremony at the 16th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM16) in Busan, Republic of Korea.

This joint side event brings together the ISGAN and Hydrogen TCP Awards of Excellence, highlighting their shared commitment to accelerating the energy transition through innovation and international collaboration.

The ISGAN Awards of Excellence honour impactful and scalable smart grid initiatives that aim to demonstrate enhanced flexibility, resilience, and efficiency in power systems. By recognising replicable projects worldwide, the awards facilitate peer learning and foster collaboration among policymakers, industry, and experts. 11th ISGAN Awards honour global smart grid excellence under the theme “Solutions for Enhanced Grid Operations”. The awards ceremony showcases scalable innovations and connects policymakers and industry leaders to advance smarter, more flexible, and resilient power systems through international collaboration.

The Hydrogen TCP Awards of Excellence celebrate breakthrough achievements in hydrogen technologies, aligning with CEM priorities by recognising innovations that are essential for the decarbonisation of industry, transport, and energy systems. These awards serve to raise visibility, promote knowledge exchange, and encourage the adoption of best practices within and beyond the hydrogen sector.

Together, these awards demonstrate how multilateral cooperation and targeted recognition can accelerate technological deployment, strengthen policy coordination, and advance shared clean energy goals. The event will offer high-level visibility for the awardees and actionable insights for the broader CEM community.

Stay tuned for more details on the award recipients and event highlights.

Foresight and strategic intelligence play crucial roles in the long-term strategic planning of future resilient distribution grids, particularly in uncertain and complex environments like those related to the energy transition and climate change mitigation and adaptation.

This phase is critical for ensuring that strategic decisions and plans are based on robust and actionable information, even if accurate predictions of future requirements for grids cannot be made.

The essence of making informed decisions and deploying effective steering mechanisms in distribution grid planning is in the centre of discussion for ISGAN Lighthouse Webinars organised on September 10 and October 1, 2025.

The speakers

	Klaus Kubeczko Senior Expert Advisor at AIT Austria
	Julio Braslavsky Senior Principal Research Scientist at CSIRO Australia
	Prathaban Moodley General Manager: Applied Energy R&D and Innovation at South African National Energy Development Institute (SANEDI) South Africa
	Branislav Iglar Research Engineer Integrated Energy Systems Center for Energy at AIT Austria
	Terijo Lovasz Project Officer at CSIRO Australia

Intended audience

Policy makers, regulators, energy agencies, distribution system operators and utilities, public and private grd infrastructure owners, researchers.

Further reading:

• ISGAN Policy Brief On Long-Term Planning and Implementation of Smart Distribution Grids
• Lighthouse Project on Smart Distribution Grids

His participation showcased the breadth and depth of SIRFN’s ongoing joint research activities, presenting cutting-edge work in the simulation, validation and control of future-ready power systems.

Poster presentation

At the conference, Dr Obusevs presented two posters. The first of them showed the progress of VEHICLE (Validation of bEnchmark system for cHargIng ControL in-vEstigation), which was developed in collaboration with SIRFN partners from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) (Denmark), RSE (Italy), the University of Strathclyde (UK), and Natural Resources Canada (Canada). Led by ZHAW and supported by DTU’s SYSLAB infrastructure, the researchers created, validated and combined a set of components that make it possible to work with topologies.

These topologies provide a robust testing environment in which researchers and system operators can design and evaluate control strategies for smart infrastructures based on real-world component behaviour.

This work illustrates the value of coordinated access to international laboratory infrastructure — a core strength of the SIRFN platform.

The second poster was created in collaboration with Scandinavian partners from SINTEF Energy Research and explores geographically distributed coupling between two bulk power systems. By combining the initial dynamic model of continental Europe (IDMCE) with the Nordic power system model (NPSM) and a corresponding high-voltage direct-current (HVDC) interconnection, three real-time implementation schemes were developed using OPAL-RT simulators.

This distributed method addresses a critical issue in multinational research by enabling the study of large, complex power systems without the need to share confidential models or data across borders. The geographically distributed scheme offers a viable alternative for very large power systems, overcoming limitations such as system size and restrictions on model sharing due to non-disclosure agreements.

Panel session
As part of Panel Session 6, ‘Key Stability Aspects in the Operation of Future Power Systems: A European Perspective’, Dr Obusevs presented SIRFN’s work on the Open System Validation Platform (OpenSVP). He emphasised the importance of testing converter-interfaced generation to ensure compliance with regional network codes. The Working Group found that this is not always the case, which could pose a potentially significant hidden threat to our power systems.

Artjoms Obusevs’ contributions at PowerTech2025 reflect ISGAN SIRFN’s commitment to facilitating high-quality, collaborative research that informs the design and operation of future power systems. Such activities not only build technical capacity and deliver practical solutions for the global energy transition.

Join us for a webinar with José Villar (INESC-TEC, Portugal) on managing collective self-consumption and local flexibility using the RECreation platform.

The RECreation platform started with the national Portuguese project DigitalCER, and has been enhanced with flexibility markets support in the BeFlexible project, where it is also being integrated into the GDBN, a digital platform to support the flexibility energy-centric value chain (topic of a future webinar) and into SAP store and ecosystems.

In this webinar, we will explore key concepts such as self-consumption, sharing mechanisms, and allocation coefficients, as well as the structure and operation of Renewable Energy Communities (RECs). The session will cover local energy markets, pricing mechanisms, transaction management, and settlement processes. Additionally, we will discuss how RECreation can support the participation of REC in flexibility markets.

A live demonstration or illustrative slides of the RECreation platform will highlight its key functionalities and practical applications. Don’t miss this opportunity to delve into innovative energy solutions.

The speaker

José Villar Centre for Energy Systems INESC TEC

Intended audience

Energy professionals, Engineers, Researchers, Academics, Policy makers, Regulators, Utility companies, Distribution System Operators (DSOs), Project managers, EU project stakeholders, Renewable Energy Community (REC) members, Energy community promoters, Technology developers.

Key messages

• Collective self-consumption integrates final consumers into the energy markets and helps to integrate renewable generation, reduces reliance on external supply and improves local energy balance.
• The RECreation platform enables efficient management of collective self-consumption through transparent sharing mechanisms and allocation coefficients.
• RECreation provides practical tools for transactions, settlement, and integration with DSOs.
• Local energy markets and pricing models are essential for empowering Renewable Energy Communities (RECs).
• RECreation provides support for flexibility markets, which can enhance the operational and economic performance of RECs.

Further reading:

• BeFlexible – Framework for Flexibility-Centric Energy
  https://beflexible.eu/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/BeFlexible-D1.2-Framework-for-Flexibility-Centric-Energy.pdf

• Impact of different regulatory approaches in Renewable Energy Communities: A quantitative comparison of European implementations
  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2024.114399

• Decarbonized and inclusive energy: a two-fold strategy for Renewable Energy Communities
  https://doi.org/10.1109/MPE.2024.3396442

• Integrating flexibility and energy local markets with wholesale balancing responsibilities in the context of renewable energy communities
  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2023.128853

• A Three-Stage Model to Manage Energy Communities, Share Benefits and Provide Local Grid Services
  https://doi.org/10.3390/en16031143

• Towards Future Smart Power Systems with High Penetration of Renewables (Elsevier, 1st Edition), Chapter 6: Self-consumption and energy communities
  978-0-443-29871-4
  

ISGAN Virtual Learning and the ISGAN Lighthouse Project on Smart Distribution Grids invite you to a webinar where we will introduce a new framework for understanding the dynamics of long-term planning and implementation of smart distribution grids. This framework offers insights to help navigate the landscape of increasing complexity and uncertainty associated with distribution grid modernization globally.

We will present the framework, which lays out five essential phases of long-term planning and three enabling framework conditions, offering a structured understanding of how different actor groups are involved in these processes. The webinar will also highlight key messages from the ISGAN Policy Brief on this theme, which was recently launched in conjunction with the Clean Energy Ministerial meeting (CEM15) in Brazil.

The speakers

	Helena Lindquist Project Manager, ISGAN Lighthouse Project on Smart Distribution Grids
	Susanne Ackeby ISGAN Working Group 6, Power T&D Systems, Research Institutes of Sweden (RISE)
	Klaus Kubeczko ISGAN Working Group 7, Smart Grids Transitions, Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT)

Intended audience

The webinar is designed for professionals involved in strategic decision-making and risk management across various sectors.

The expected audience includes:
Business Leaders and Executives: Individuals responsible for setting organizational direction and strategy.
Project Managers: Professionals overseeing projects that require adaptability to changing conditions.
Risk Management Specialists: Experts focused on identifying and mitigating potential risks.
Financial Analysts and Planners: Individuals managing financial forecasting and budgeting under uncertain scenarios.
Policy Makers and Regulators: Authorities crafting policies that must account for future uncertainties.

Key messages

This webinar aims to equip participants with practical tools and insights to enhance their planning capabilities, ensuring resilience and agility in the face of unpredictable challenges.

Join us for a webinar titled “Flexible Operation of Energy Communities under Uncertainty in Energy Markets,” featuring insights from Llorenç Burgas Nadal (Universitat de Girona) and Albert Solà Vilalta (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya), based on their work within the OptiREC project, which focuses on developing solutions for Energy Communities in the Spanish context.

This session will explore innovative methodologies for flexibility estimation, asset forecasting, and optimization to enhance the participation of energy communities. Llorenç Burgas will demonstrate how these techniques can be implemented on platforms like Home Assistant to engage domestic users. Albert Solà will present multi-stage stochastic programming models designed to address challenges posed by uncertain renewable generation and fluctuating electricity prices, optimizing energy communities’ participation in electricity markets.

The speakers

	Albert Solà Vilalta Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya
	Llorenç Burgas Nadal Universitat de Girona

Intended audience

Researchers, policy makers, junior engineers and students, senior engineers.

Key messages

Flexibility estimation

Multi-Market Market Participation under Price and Renewable Uncertainty.

Case Studies to Analyse Regulatory Frameworks for Energy Communities in Europe.

We will start with the patented, world-first, hybrid fluidised bed (HFB) gasification system, which converts solid biomass into a clean, high-energy gas. This gas is combusted in the gas turbine at high temperatures, resulting in highly efficient power generation that sets new industry standards. Efficiency is further enhanced through the use of steam generated from exhaust gases and waste heat from the gasifier. This steam is injected into the gas turbine, significantly boosting power output. The final step of the process focuses on smart heat recovery. All steam is condensed, enabling the recycling of water. The low-temperature heat produced at this stage is efficiently utilised for district heating, CO₂ capture, and biomass drying, contributing to the system’s overall sustainability. The Bio-FlexGen’s integrated approach does more than just generate power. It represents a transformative advancement in energy efficiency and environmental sustainability, making a positive impact beyond traditional power generation. Our engineers will explore these innovations in depth, providing insightful knowledge for PHD students, engineers, and investors in the bioenergy field.

Further reading: https://bioflexgen.eu/

Watch past webinars here: ISGAN Virtual Learning

Visit ISGAN: https://www.iea-isgan.org/

The speakers

	Michael Bartlett CTO and Founding Partner Phoenix BioPower
	Jens Pålsson Senior Plant Engineer Phoenix BioPower
	Chunguang Zhou Chief engineer, Head of Gasification Phoenix BioPower
	Felix Guethe Chief engineer Combustion Phoenix BioPower

Intended audience

Senior engineers and potential investors

Key messages

Main achievements:

• Plant
  • On-demand power: Flexible, local, renewable
  • Biomass wastes as feedstock (i.e., forest, agriculture, and demolition)
  • Carbon Dioxide Removal
  • 50-80% more electricity from biomass
  • 3 x more local power from district heating (CHP)
• Gasification
• • The world’s first Hybrid Fluidised Bed (HFB) gasification system
  • Cost-effective and efficient at high pressure
  • Flexibility: Low-cost feedstocks, operates with oxygen gas or air for hydrogen or electricity production, broad turndown for 0-100% electricity output on biomass
  • Development to Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 4
• Combustion
  • Unique, patented Phoenix Advanced Combustion System (PACS)
  • Low nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions, high stability and broad operating window with high steam levels
  • Fuel flexibility: hydrogen/syngas/methane/mixtures
  • Development to Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 4

Further watching and reading

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7234439590487490561/

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7231917952462123008/

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7229381289512968193/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/76118039/admin/page-posts/published/

https://bioflexgen.eu/investors/

https://bioflexgen.eu/solutions/

https://phoenixbiopower.com/

ISGAN Virtual Learning and OptiREC project invite you to an insightful webinar on the approaches to integrate Energy Communities into the Spanish electricity system.

The EU policy recognizes energy communities as pivotal for achieving energy transition goals. However, integrating this new actor into the existing electricity system landscape remains an open topic, especially as large-scale energy community development reaches a critical mass impacting system and market operations.

The OptiREC project investigates the technical and regulatory challenges posed by the large-scale development and integration of energy communities within the Spanish electricity system. Join us for a webinar where we’ll discuss the OptiREC project’s achievements, focusing on the development of optimal multi-layer coordination among community members, Distribution System Operators (DSOs), and Transmission System Operators (TSOs).

Moreover, OptiREC presents two optimization models designed to simulate the operations of an Energy Community (EC), focusing on energy trading among peers and evaluating the EC’s potential to offer flexibility as a service to the distribution network operator (DSO). Employing the second-order cone programming representation, the mathematical formulations include the distribution network limitations and consider distributed energy resources such as rooftop solar panels, energy storage systems, electric vehicles, and heat pumps. The models were executed over a year with one-hour time steps using the IEEE European Low Voltage test feeder, adapted to a single-phase version, for testing the formulations. Thus, the first model reflects exclusive peer-to-peer (P2P) operations, while the second model isolates flexibility considerations. This approach enables a comprehensive examination of how introducing a flexibility market influences the trading patterns within the community. Through statistical analysis of the annual data generated by the optimization models, the study identifies hours with a higher likelihood for the EC to offer flexibility services and estimates the potential quantity of such services.

These insights provide valuable characterizations of the EC concerning demand, energy trading, and flexibility provision. As a result, the DSO could enhance daily operational planning conditions based on a better understanding of the EC’s dynamics and capabilities.

The speakers:

	Seyedamir Mansouri Universidad Pontificia Comillas IIT Institute for Research in Technology
	Albert Farriol Salas IREC Fundació Institut de Recerca en Energia de Catalunya

Intended audience

Researchers and academics interested in energy transition, community energy, and grid integration.
Technology providers and solution developers offering products and services for energy community integration and grid optimization.
Representatives from energy communities, including community organizers, leaders, and members.
Professionals and experts in the energy sector, including policymakers, regulators, and energy industry stakeholders.
Utility companies, DSOs, and TSOs seeking insights into integrating energy communities into the electricity system.

Key messages

• Cloud computing platforms to integrate energy communities into existing energy markets.
• Coordinated frameworks to extract flexibility from community members.
• P2P power sharing among community members to enhance economic, technical, and efficiency indices.

ISGAN Virtual Learning invites you to an informative webinar focused on the implementation and benefits of hybrid power systems in insular environments. This session will feature insights from the SINNOGENES EU project’s pilot on the island of Ikaria, Greece. We will delve into technology integration, challenges, and potential grid enhancements.

Additionally, we will highlight the significance of adopting AI technology and simulation to facilitate the management of transport fleets and the synergy with the energy networks, in a hydrogen-oriented environment located in Geneva, Switzerland.
Furthermore, the webinar will explore prospective modelling of the European energy system to elucidate the role of specific technologies in meeting future energy needs. We will present the Artelys Crystal Super Grid modelling tool, showcasing its effectiveness in analyzing the role of storage technologies in providing flexibility to the European energy system, as part of the SINNOGENES project.

The speakers:

	Nikos Andriopoulos, Researcher, Independent Power Transmission Operator
	Quentin Matthewson, Technical project manager, Transports Publics Genevois
	Georgios Spanos, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre for Research and Technology-Hellas
	Grégoire Thillaye du Boullay, Project Manager, Artelys France

Intended audience

Policy makers, utility managers, TSOs, DSOs, renewable energy professionals, PTOs, PTAs engineers involved in power system planning and operation and in software development, and academic researchers in energy studies, public transport, and AI.

Key messages

• Demonstration of the integration of wind and pumped hydro storage in an insular grid to enhance energy .resilience and sustainability.
• Highlighting the technical and economic benefits of hybrid power systems in reducing reliance on conventional energy sources.
• Presentation of Ikaria as a model for renewable energy integration in island settings.
• Emphasis to AI technology for energy consumption optimization and fuel cell lifetime increase
• Highlighting the importance of RES penetration increase for mobility
• Presentation of on demand service for public transportation in Geneva using hydrogen vehicles
• Using Artelys Crystal Super Grid to model a multi-energy transition pathway for the European energy system will make it possible to represent the gradual uptake of innovative storage and flexibility technologies and to assess the impact of their integration.
• The role and the impact of these technologies can be assessed using various indicators, in particular by evaluating their contribution to flexibility needs.

Key highlights included:
– The significance of upcoming global energy gatherings like the energy ministerial in Brazil, MI, and COP29 in Bankoo, alongside a pressing grid infrastructure issue highlighted by recent media attention, especially in the US.
– Emphasizing ISGAN’s role in capitalizing on current momentum to achieve ambitious goals, focusing on renewables and energy efficiency while advancing grid infrastructure.

The meeting adopted a “tour de table” format, with each country sharing its developments, facilitating comparisons. Presentations covered diverse national strategies:

– European Commission: Focused on accelerating grid projects and enhancing regulatory incentives.
– Sweden: Discussed ongoing discussions on nuclear, hydrogen, and energy communities.
– Austria: Emphasized energy community integration and climate-focused strategies.
– The Netherlands: Addressed grid congestion challenges and the need for flexibility market development.
– Denmark: Highlighted renewable energy dominance, EV charging innovations, and smart grid legislation.
– Germany: Outlined plans for a renewables-centric future and hydrogen infrastructure.
– Belgium: Stressed renewable energy expansion, grid security, and collaborative initiatives.
– Korea: Presented a smart grid implementation plan with a focus on enhancing power supply flexibility.
– South Africa: Discussed liberalization efforts, renewable energy expansion, and grid challenges.
– Australia: Examined energy sector decarbonization challenges and renewable energy penetration.
– USA: Detailed ambitious emissions reduction goals, legislative initiatives, and grid resilience efforts.

Key themes and challenges emerged:
– Concerns over grid capacity lagging behind renewable deployment.
– Growing interest in smart grid solutions and interconnections.
– The need for policymakers to grasp technical challenges and bridge the gap between policy and implementation.
– Suggestions for simplified communication methods and leveraging international platforms for dissemination.

Future considerations included evaluating progress towards goals, outreach to non-participating countries, and synthesizing key insights for broader dissemination.
   

Utilizing untapped Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) potential from customers in the distribution grid necessitates TSO-DSO-Customer coordination. Customers, who consume, store, or generate electricity, have shown attractive potential for ancillary services to power systems, but they still face challenges managing and marketing their flexibility in the energy market. Aggregators can facilitate these flexibilities as an intermediary by providing services to different power systems participants. This poses new challenges for monitoring, controlling, and coordinating customers’ and other market player’s needs.

This webinar aims to disseminate knowledge about aggregators in power systems, address the challenges encountered, both technical and non-technical, and share experiences from pilot projects. Participants will gain insights to apply and expand the impact of aggregator roles in the context of their own countries.

Speakers

	Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Sebastian Lehnhoff OFFIS
	Marcel Otte OFFIS
	Dr.-Ing. Jirapa Kamsamrong OFFIS
	Annike Abromeit EEBUS
	Dr. Christian Kunze Smart Innovation Norway
Moderates:
	Dr. José Pablo Chaves Ávila Comillas Pontifical University

Intended audience

Policymakers, TSOs, DSOs, NGOs, aggregators, governmental agencies, researchers, interested participants, students, etc.

Key messages

A regulatory framework with a clear definition of the aggregator role should be established in each country to enhance competitiveness, transparency, and societal welfare. Coordination approaches have to be established among aggregators, customers and grid operator with the focus on harmonised and interoperable solutions. Moreover, innovative approaches can be tested in demonstration and R&D projects with temporary regulatory changes and experiments (e.g. regulatory sandboxes), which can help to address the technical and non-technical challenges and support needed for the real deployment.

Modern digital telecommunication infrastructures will soon allow to be adjusted to the energy industry needs, providing the opportunity to implement edge computing trough cloud native applications.

To simplify the integration of the 5G digital telco infrastructures’ functionalities, increasing reliability and flexibility and reducing the latency, the Smart5Grid project propose the concept of Network Applications, together with a platform to automatically validate and verify those applications, fostering the creation of a new ecosystem of device virtualization experts.

Further reading: https://smart5grid.eu/dissemination-activities/brochures/

Speaker

Daniele Porcu (Enel Grids)

Intended audience

System Operators’ O&M experts, Technology experts and researchers, System integrators, Junior engineers and students, SMEs and technologic start-ups, device manufacturers for power plants automation (production, transmission, distribution)

Key messages

• 5G offers the opportunity to interact with the Core Network to provide services
• The complexity of such integration is a barrier, but Smart5Grid project proposes an innovative approach
• We are able to provide a novel concept of Network Application to simplify the 5G complexity
• Our set of tools can facilitate the access to this technology, fostering the creation of a new market segment for digital services: they are open for everyone who wants to learn more!

Navigating Australia’s Grid Transformation: A Postcard from the Future

Australia’s GW-scale electric power systems are experiencing some of the world’s fastest transformations and provide something of a ‘postcard from the future’ for many jurisdictions. These transformational forces are impacting all vertical layers of the legacy system, including bulk power, transmission, distribution and energy retail.  Australian energy customers are also actively influencing the nature of the transformation to a degree that is without precedent in the history of electric grids.

In the context of accelerating withdrawal of dispatchable synchronous generation, Australia’s transformation is being supercharged by massive deployment of utility-scale Variable Renewable Energy (VRE) and world-leading levels of Distributed Energy Resources (DER).  As the proportion of VRE and DER continues to grow, a step-change uplift in system capabilities becomes essential to ready them for reliable and cost-efficient operation in deeply decarbonized future.

Leveraging Global Insight for Navigation

Digitalisation, interoperability, transport electrification, enhanced asset utilisation and Distribution System Operator (DSO) models, for example, all have much promise in such an environment.  However, it is often poorly understood that all such solutions, and many others, cannot achieve their full potential without the underpinning structural relationships or ‘architecture’ of the grid being made future ready.

The presentation will highlight how the navigation of Australia’s transformation is increasingly informed by an integrated set of tools that support holistic grid transformation, many of which have benefited from seminal global research and development, especially in Europe and North America.

Speaker

Mark Paterson (Energy Catalyst) Mark Paterson is Energy Catalyst’s Principal and Lead Systems Architect. With over two decades in the energy sector, Mark works at the intersection of strategic futures and scalable, ‘least regrets’ action. At CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, he led several major energy system transformation projects as Chair of the CSIRO Future Grid Forum and Program Director of the CSIRO/ENA Electricity Network Transformation Roadmap. At energy utilities Horizon Power and Energex, he led the innovative development and scale deployment of several technology innovation firsts. Over much of the last decade, Mark has been privileged to develop leading expertise in Systems Architecture-based disciplines which are now increasingly recognised as critical for enabling the deep decarbonization of legacy power systems. He is formally trained in both the Systems Architecture and Grid Architecture methodologies developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the US Department of Energy’s Grid Modernisation Laboratory Consortia (GMLC) respectively. Focused on future-informed action, this expertise is further complemented by Strategic Foresight and Technology Roadmapping methodologies developed by EDHEC in Europe and Cambridge University in the UK.

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

After our recent ExCo26 meeting in Utrecht, members were fortunate to have the opportunity to visit a site showcasing three remarkable smart grid projects. This visit provided invaluable insights into the latest advancements and innovations in smart grid implementation, particularly in relation to the integration of buildings and electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

One of the projects on display was SmoothEMS with Gridshield. This cutting-edge grid tool demonstrates the seamless integration of smart energy management technologies. By focusing on the capabilities and behaviors of EV charging, this project works to develop a reliable and resilient power supply for neighborhoods and promote energy efficiency and reduced reliance on fossil fuels.

Next, we saw some of the infrastructure for A.S.R. VAP DC. This project provides research results on the application in charging plazas of the Droop Rate Control Strategy for active DC grids that can autonomously regulate variable supply (solar energy), demand (cars, lighting) and even storage capacity and grid configuration (Vehicle-to-Grid via ISO). This innovation has great potential for the growth market of large office buildings that want to significantly reduce their carbon footprint by creating EV charging plazas. Indeed, ASR has a dedicated gas-free garage that makes optimal use of green energy. As a result, ASR is already complying with the Paris Proof Commitment and have the BREEAM in-use certificate at an excellent level.

Finally, we learned about MOOI TROEF, a remarkable “Internet-of-Energy” platform that shows how to achieve more value through collaboration. TROEF shows the potential for enhancing energy efficiency and sustainability by incorporating real-time data analytics, predictive control algorithms, and demand response capabilities to help users to understand the optimal time and source the right energy at the right time. Overall, the project demonstrates how smarter choices can help reduce the CO2 footprint, reduce costs, and give users more value on their investment in green energy.

The visit left a lasting impression and highlighted the possibilities for smart grid implementation. Such projects are crucial in driving the transition towards a sustainable and resilient energy future.

More information about the 3 projects can be found here:

SmoothEMS met Gridshield • Projecten • ElaadNL

Homepage – TROEF sharing energy (troef-energy.nl)

Veilig en autonoom regelend PV laadplein met DC-distributie – Topsector Energie

The annual ISGAN Award of Excellence recognizes excellence in smart grid projects, policies, and programs around the world. Each round of the competition focuses on one or more themes that showcase innovative solutions for critical aspects of grid modernization.

At this event, ISGAN will honour excellence on “Excellence in Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Smart Grid,” in partnership with Global Smart Energy Federation (GSEF).

This round of award competition highlights the critical role of AI technologies for smart grids in accelerating decarbonization and the necessity of modernization. During the webinar, honorees will share project highlights that can be adapted or adopted in other markets and regions.

By showcasing exemplars in the global smart grid community, the event will promote the exchange of lessons learned and emerging best practices, as well as the creation of a shared understanding of the value that smarter, more flexible electricity systems can bring.

Speakers

• Luisa Matos, Cleanwatts S.A.
• Sébastien Brun, Enedis S.A.
• HyeSeon Lee, Korea Electric Power Corporation(KEPCO)
• Gautam Kumar, CTO, IntelliSmart

Intended audience

policy makers, junior engineers and students, senior engineers, etc.

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

In this webinar, ISGAN Working Group 9 (WG9) will explore the projects’ developments concerning the digital twinning capability in the UK energy market and their potential implications for future interactions. This session aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of how these projects are contributing to the evolution of the energy industry.

Speaker

Greg Johnston (Energy Systems Catapult)

Charmalee Jayamaha (Energy Systems Catapult)

Intended audience

Individuals working on digitalisation of energy systems; primarily senior technical staff, policymakers, data experts.

Key messages

– Data licensing, standardisation and interoperability are key emergent issues
– Standardised patterns for sharing data is a key component to drive interoperability.

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

Europe’s swiftly changing energy landscape is confronted with pressing challenges, underscoring the need for collaborative Research & Development (R&D) efforts centered on producing open-source energy system simulation tools. In pursuit of this goal, CRESYM champions open-source principles, fostering efficient collaborations that tackle low-TRL R&D topics of wide interest by maintaining technological advancements accessible to all researchers and engineers. During this webinar, we’ll highlight significant milestones from CRESYM’s main project within the smart grid domain.

CRESYM is a non-profit association, gathering industry players and research organisations, and undertaking research actions to solve the energy sector’s upcoming challenges. After power system stability, and multienergy matters, it calls for volunteering operators to set up a research program to unlock remaining barriers for the digitalisation of distribution networks.

More info on https://cresym.eu/

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

Intended audience

Senior engineers and decision makers of Distribution Network Operators, who face key digitalisation issues, and ready to share their needs (and possibly, but not compulsorily, fund) a research program that would address them.

Key messages

• CRESYM invites energy operators to share their research needs and organises research projects.
• CRESYM increase the visibility of, and acces to, research outcomes, while relieving their inventors of the related maintenance burden.
• CRESYM enlarges its activity to distribution matters and invites distribution operators to join.

Further information

• More info on https://cresym.eu/

Many studies have attested the manifold barriers that residential consumers find to become providers of flexibility services. A research with consumers shows unmet needs that can be tapped unto to create value for consumers. In the BeFlexible project we propose five value propositions that can be used to sell flexibility services to residential consumers.

More info on https://beflexible.eu/

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

Intended audience

Policy makers, senior and junior engineers, ESCOs and aggregators.

Key messages

Flexibility provision creates value for consumer.

Five value propositions to entice consumers to become flexibility providers.

Further information

• More info on https://beflexible.eu/

In this webinar, recent results on the optimal bidding and operation of DVPPs considering different types of uncertainties will be presented. Energy and ancillary service market participation is defined by means of a novel robust optimization algorithm. Energy and service provision are then guaranteed close-to-real-time through a continuous optimal redispatch tool.

More info on https://posytyf-h2020.eu/

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Intended audience

Researchers, policy makers and regulatory agents, practitioners, system operators, and other Power system engineers, from students to senior experts.

Key messages

The new DVPP concept fully integrates the dynamic aspects at all levels: locally (for each RES generator), globally (for grid ancillary services and interaction with other neighbour elements of the grid) and economically (for internal optimal dispatch and participation to electricity markets)

A DVPP is a set of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) along with a set of control and operation procedures. This means methodologies for:

• choosing the participating RES, optimal and continuous operation as a whole (especially in case of loss of natural resources – e.g., wind, sun – on a part of the DVPP),
• regulation (in the dynamic sense) to ensure local objectives for each generator,
• participation to ancillary services of the DVPP as a unit and to diminish negative effects of interaction with neighbour dynamics elements of the power system,
• integration in both actual power systems scenarios (with mixed classic and power electronics-based generation) and future ones with high degree of RES penetration

Further information

• More info on https://posytyf-h2020.eu/

The electrical energy system is transitioning in the way that electricity is generated, transmitted and distributed. Due to these changes, system operators are faced with various challenges (technical, ICT, regulatory and economic) to accommodate new technologies due to the drive toward modern power systems. However, these changes have also allowed for the increased opportunity for system development and the inclusion of new market players. Flexibility will provide network operators (together with other stakeholders such as prosumers, aggregators, etc.) with the possibly to increase the stability of the electrical system and ensure the safe, secure and reliably of supply. Stakeholder interaction is key to facilitate and enable the integration and utilization of flexibility in future power systems. Furthermore, flexibility has traditionally been utilised in the operation stage, for balancing power flows, solve congestions, maintain stability; now, the next level of flexibility can be defined and deployed since the power system planning stage, being integrated into procedures for long-term planning and correspondent market mechanisms for procuring and adequately reward the flexibility providers also in terms of resilience increase.

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

• Engage in discussion and collaboration to address the topics related to flexibility and power system resilience
• Share experiences and lessons learned based on the outcomes of various pilot projects related to stakeholder interaction
• Share best practices on the topic of “Flexibility for resilience” in integrated systems, through collaboration.
• The information collected from the workshop will be incorporated into dissemination material (policy briefs, discussion paper, etc)

When? 29th of September 09:00-15:00 Where? Koningsbergerstraat 9, 3531 AJ  Utrecht, the Netherlands

AGENDA

***Note: Due to limited seating capacity we cannot guarantee that your registration will allow for your participation in the workshop. Workshop participants will receive an official confirmation.

CONTACT

Irina Oleinikova: irina.oleinikova[at]ntnu.no
Barbara Herndler: barbara.herndler[at]ait.ac.at

This webinar presents the challenges and solutions related to the long term grid planning process in order to have a process that is an enabler for the energy transition.

Different aspects are considered such as:

• How to handle uncertainty, complexity, new risks and threats
  • what to consider and tools to use
• What regulatory adaptations are required?
• How to maintain a competent, capable and resilient workforce?
• How to ensure efficient stakeholder interaction?

The webinar will also provide information about the knowledge sharing process.

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

Intended audience

The foreseen audience of this webinar are policy makers and stakeholders that impacts or are impacted by the grid planning process: Network operators (TSO/DSO), network planning engineers, researchers, regulators, etc.

Key messages

To overcome the complexities and uncertainties challenging the grid planning efficient, transparent and legitimate planning processes are required that are guided by sound principles and effective steering mechanisms.

It is critical that grid planning aligns with and acts as an enabler for the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) e.g. regarding scenarios utilized and grid development plans developed.

Existing cost-benefit analyses should be updated to properly capture the values of sufficient grid capacity and account for social, environmental, and resilience metrics.

Stakeholder interaction is needed at all levels of the grid planning process and in co-creating solutions, methods and tools that are needed to manage the various challenges.

Further information

• Once published, the project report will be available from the ISGAN webpage: https://www.iea-isgan.org/
• ISGAN – ISGAN leads international initiative to future-proof electrical grid planning processes (iea-isgan.org)

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Scheduled on the margins of the G20 Energy Transitions Ministerial Meeting (ETMM), this year’s Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) and Mission Innovation (MI) meetings will bring together, governments, international organizations, private sector, academia, innovators, civil society, and early career researchers and policymakers over a four-day program featuring high-level ministerial dialogues, global initiative launches, award announcements, minister-CEO roundtables, and a wide array of side-events cutting across diverse themes of clean energy transition. CEM14/MI8 will also feature a public facing technology showcase demonstrating cutting edge advances in clean energy from India and around the world.

ISGAN will organize several events during the meeting:

CEM ISGAN – MI GPFM collaboration for power system transformation, with special focus on policy and private sector engagement

Description

Power systems transformation is a core pillar of net zero transitions and a key CEM-MI focus.
The event will showcase the collaboration between ISGAN and the GPFM following to the MoU signature at CEM13/MI-7 in Pittsburgh. The event will also represent a great opportunity to explore effective ways to drive the public-private sector engagement, as well as to underline the commitment of private sector stakeholders on the ISGAN and GPFM activities. The GPFM will showcase its innovation strategy and Flagship Projects’ activities, while ISGAN will present its last outcomes and will release the KSP workshop/Inter-Working Groups reports. The event will also bring together Minister-level/Senior Officials and CEOs/CTOs in a collaborative environment to express their thoughts, opinions, and perspectives for advancing private sector engagement.
The outcomes from this side event are meant to bolster GPFM and ISGAN collaboration supporting the flexibility of the power market and digitalization of the electricity grid.

CEM-MI collaboration for technology innovation and implementation, policy, and regulatory actions to rapidly decarbonize power systems

Description

The event will showcase collaboration among ISGAN, 21CPP, GPFM, and RD20, as well as the challenges towards power system decarbonization. It will include 1 keynote/scene setting presentation by IEA or IRENA. ISGAN, 21CPP, GPFM, and RD20 will showcase their synergy and innovation strategy, main activities, and related outcomes. A high-level Roundtable on power will be held, addressing implementation, technology innovation, and policy and regulatory actions to rapidly decarbonize power systems. Concluding remarks/key recommendations will be provided by 21CPP and/or ISGAN and/or GPFM and/or RD20 Leads.

Friday 21^st July, 17:30 to 18:30, Ballroom 1

Each year, the ISGAN awards recognize the innovation, integration, and transformation of smart grid systems and policy. This year, we recognize projects that demonstrated excellence in the application of Artificial Intelligence in the electricity sector. The winners and honorees represent a range of fascinating AI applications that include detecting and diagnosing future incidents in the grid, developing and validating virtual power plants to support peer-to-peer market participation, improving the financial and operational efficiency of distribution system operators, and forecasting for distributed energy resources (DERs).

Stay tuned for our announcements, interviews, and webinars with the winners of this year’s awards.

Cross-border power flow capacities are identified as key enablers of market integration in Europe, and thus one of the main facilitators of the integration of renewable energy. Horizon2020 projects FARCROSS and TRINITY aims to enhance the cross-border capacities in the South-Eeastern European region, using optimalization solutions and grid enhancing technologies.

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Intended audience

– Policy makers (regional, EU)
– Other Horizon project consortiums
– TSOs
– Other experts in the smart energy domain

Key messages

1) Cross – border power transmission connections in the SEE countries typically suffer from congestion, lack of contingency and market inconsistencies. At the same time, the available RES aren’t injected to the transmission corridors in a cost – effective and secure way, making the need for transmission asset upgrade vital.

2) The 2 projects – FARCROSS and TRINITY – are developing and testing solutions with a different approach. On a software level, T – SENTINEL (TRINITY) remedies grid overloading conditions,. On a hardware level, among other solutions, SmartValves (FARCROSS) are introduced as a means to divert power flows from congested lines. The utilization of both technologies can be expected to offer significant improvements in terms of flexibility, making the cross-border connections more robust and adaptive to the evolution of the electrical power industry.

Further information

https://farcross.eu/

https://trinityh2020.eu/

Once registered, please check your email inbox and ensure that the invitation email is not marked as spam. Please add “isgan@comillas.edu” and “newsletter@iea-isgan.org” to your email whitelist.

The annual ISGAN Awards of Excellence recognize excellence in smart grid projects around the world. At the 8th Award competition, ISGAN honored excellence on the theme: “EV Integration in Smart Grid,” in partnership with the Global Smart Energy Federation (GSEF).

The honorees will share project highlights that can be adapted or adopted in other markets and regions. By showcasing exemplars in the global smart grid community, the event will promote exchange of lessons learned and emerging best practice, as well as the creation of a shared understanding of the value that smarter, more flexible electricity systems can bring.

Speakers

KiJun Park (Korea Electric Power Corporation)
Baerte De Brey (STEDIN)

Intended audience

Policy makers, Junior / Senior engineers / Students

Key messages

In most low-carbon scenarios, electric vehicle (EV) integration is a critical vector for decarbonization of transport. However, effective EV integration presents a variety of high-stakes, technical challenges for electricity network operators that must be resolved for that promise to be realized at a speed and scale consistent with global climate and clean energy objectives. EV charging is a considerable load on the electric grid that can impact the power quality. This webinar would draw your attention to the role that smart grids play for making EV integration possible.

Further information

ISGAN Award 2022 – Excellence of EV Integration in Smart Grid

ISGAN welcomes its new Vice-Chair Wickie Lassen Agdal, delegate from Denmark. Wickie has been programme manager with the Danish Energy Agency since 2017 and has been the national delegate for Denmark in ISGAN since 2019. Wickie says that she embraces her new role as ISGAN Vice Chair as the experience in the ExCo so far has been very enlightening – Her hope is to get more involved, and she will contribute with her knowledge about the topic of Smart Grids and the electricity system. Apart from the new Vice-Chair, ISGAN’s leadership team currently consists of one Chair, Luciano Martini, Italy and two vice-Chairs Russell Conklin, USA and Arun Kumar Mishra, India.

ISGAN also welcomed a  guest participant, Emily Mitchell from the Photovoltaic Power Systems TCP (PVPS) who provided an overview of the recent highlights and publications based on current topics of PVPS. Furthermore, ISGAN’s input was sought for setting up a new task in PVPS concerning system integration of PV.

One focus of the meeting was the six Working Groups of ISGAN. Their strengths and challenges were focused on and further even stronger cooperation between the working groups on an urgent topic is planned.

Further plans were made for ISGAN to contribute with several highly relevant workshops to the upcoming Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) Events in India later this year.

Two Side-Events completed the ExCo meeting. The first took place before the meeting and focused on the national priorities and strategies of ISGAN’s participating countries. Valuable input from this side-event provided the foundation for further discussions and steered the direction for topics in which ISGAN should increase its focus.

The second side event was the Knowledge Sharing Project workshop on Network Planning under Uncertainties. More details about this workshop and the whole project with high international participation can be found here.

The Executive Committee of ISGAN will reconvene for the 26^th meeting in September 2023 in The Netherlands.

The 9th International Conference for the Integration of Renewable & Distributed Energy Resources (IRED 2022) gathered researchers from 14 different countries to share information on state-of-the-art technologies, research, and applications. ISGAN delegates and experts played a key role.

IRED 2022 was held in Adelaide, Australia, and organized by John Ward and his team at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).

During the opening day, a session on Mission Innovation’s Green Powered Future Mission (GPFM) included ISGAN Chair Luciano Martini. ISGAN and GPFM recently signed an MOU to formalize their collaborations which will benefit members and facilitate the broader energy transition.

On Day 2, Ron Brandl, manager of ISGAN’s Smart Grid International Research Facility Network (SIRFN) introduced the importance of international research collaboration and was followed by Mihai Calin, Operating Agent of ISGAN, who hosted a panel “How Can Testing Accelerate Renewable Energy Integration?”

On the third day of IRED 2022, Austrian expert Barbara Herndler presented the results from the Working Group 6 task on DSO-TSO interaction. Finally, Matteo Troncia and Jose Pablo José Pablo Chaves from Spain won the 2022 IRED Poster Competition for their submission, “Flexibility Markets for Voltage Control in Transmission and Distribution Grids: Quantitative Assessment of a Realistic Case Study.”

IRED 2022 offered ISGAN delegates and experts the opportunity to share their knowledge and learn from outside experts and we hope the collaborations between ISGAN and IRED continue for IRED 2024. 

The regained personal interaction was particularly well utilized through a session in the World Café, during which highlights of the working groups were presented and discussed. This session encouraged close interaction between the Working Group Managers and ExCo members. ExCo members made suggestions based on their national strategies and goals on what they believe working groups should consider in their subsequent Programmes of Work.

Another session focused on ISGAN´s interaction with the IEA and other Technology Collaboration Programmes, the Mission Innovation Green Powered Future Mission, and the Clean Energy Ministerial. Indeed, one of ISGAN’s key activities is centered around engaging and cooperating with external stakeholders and initiatives to align aims, avoid overlaps, and share knowledge.

Overall, it was great to catch up with old friends and meet new experts and representatives. We’re already preparing for ExCo 25 set for March 2023 in Berlin!

IRED is a global conference gathering experts from industry, government and academia to share information on state-of-the-art technologies, research and know-how and engage in lively discussions related to the integration of renewable and distributed energy resources into power systems. The conference will focus on the technical, market, and regulatory issues that challenge the integration of these resources into the grid. For details about the event, please visit https://ired2022.com.au/

ISGAN Virtual Learning invites to this webinar that presents generic models and local control schemes of renewable energy plants for Dynamic Virtual Power Plant (DVPP) integration. This includes different power plants as wind turbines, wind farms, PV systems, biogas-, hydropower, and solar thermal power plants. The individual generating units are described in a unified model structure for local control design, simulation and the analysis of their dynamical characteristics. The derived models are intended for the integration into a higher-level control design of DVPPs.

Speakers

Stephan Kusche (HTW Berlin)
Florian Pöschke (HTW Berlin)
Horst Schulte (HTW Berlin)

Intended audience

Power plant operators, certifiers, grid operators, manufacturers of wind turbines and PV power plants, inverter manufacturers, graduate students of electrical and control engineering, control engineers and power system engineers from industry and academics

Key messages

• Presentation of physically interpretable generic models of common renewable energy power plants (RPP) such as wind turbines, photovoltaics, biogas, hydropower, and solar thermal power plants in a unified modelling framework.
• Systematic justification and description of the internal controller structure of the primary (wind, PV, solar, biogas, hydro) and secondary (synchronous machine and power electronic converters) sides of the power plant types used in the DVPP
• Straightforward performance verification of the internal control system by means of relevant test scenarios such active and reactive setpoint changes, variation of the energy source (wind, sun) of non-dispatchable plants, Grid voltage drop, Phase angle step change
• Calculation of the frequency characteristics of RPPs for DVPP design
• Discussion of the planned experimental validation in the HTW lab

Further information

https://posytyf-h2020.eu

Speakers Bio

Stephan Kusche received a Diplom degree in physical engineering and a Ph.D. in viscoelastic friction. Since then, he has worked on various control engineering tasks, such as energy optimization in process technology and modeling of renewable energy sources. His research interests include electrodynamics, continuum mechanics, and mathematical and numeric methods.

Florian Pöschke received the M. Eng. in Automation from the University of Applied Sciences HTW Berlin. He recently defended his Ph.D. at the Leuphana University Lüneburg, where his work focused on the control of wind turbines and their interaction with the electrical grid. His research interest include the dynamical modeling and control of renewable energy systems from the primary source to electrical grid connection point. Along with the application of classical approaches, his expertise lies in the treatment of nonlinear system dynamics as a convex combination of linear submodels and the subsequent control design based on linear matrix inequalities.

Horst Schulte received a degree in Electrical Engineering from TU Berlin and a Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from University Kassel (Germany). He then joined the Bosch Group (Rexroth) as a research engineer, where he worked on first principle modeling, identification, optimization, and advanced control of hydraulic pumps and motors, power systems, and drive trains. Since November 2009, he has been a full Professor at the University of Applied Sciences HTW Berlin. His research interests include nonlinear controller and observer design with Takagi-Sugeno (TS), LPV, sliding-mode techniques, robust and fault tolerant control system design. He translates these methods into industrial applications in automatic control of wind turbines and wind farms, PV power plants, the distributed control of power systems, and modeling and control of power electronic converters for sustainable power systems. He is i.e. the Chairman of the Federation of German Windpower and other Renewable Energies (FGW e.V.); Chairman of the VDI/VDE-GMA FA (Technical Committee) 5.14 Computational Intelligence; Associate Editor of the Journal ISA Transactions; Member of the IFAC Technical Committee 6.4 Fault Detection, Supervision & Safety of Techn. Processes; Vice-Chair of the IEEE CIS Task Force on “Fuzzy Systems in Renewable Energy and Smart Grids”; Member of the IEEE Control Systems Society.

Themes for ISUW 2023 Technical Paper are:

1. INDIA @ 100 in 2047: Vision for the Indian Power System
   • Net Zero Power Sector
   • Super Grids for Energy Transition
   • Role of ICT in Energy Transition
   • New Architecture of Climate and Pandemic Proof Infrastructure
2. Evolving Architecture of the 21st Century Grid with Two Way Power Flows
   • Planning And Design of Transmission Grid
   • Planning And Design of Distribution Grid with Prosumers and Electric Vehicles and Distributed Energy Resources
   • Communication Systems and Technologies for Fast Response- 1/50 (or) 1/60 Seconds
   • Separate Control Bus for IT and OT Systems
   • Climate Proofing of Future Grids
3. Electric Mobility 
   • Drones and Charging Infrastructure for Drones
   • Vehicle Grid Integration (VGI)
   • New Infrastructure Planning with Integrated EVSE
   • EVs as Virtual Power Plants (VPP)
   • Electric Highways and the Electric Grids
   • Business Models for EV Charging Stations
4. Foundational Blocks for Smart Grids
   • Learnings from Smart Grid Projects
   • Smart Microgrids for Campuses, Railway Stations, Sea Ports, Airports, Industrial Parks, Military Bases, Hotels, Hospitals, Slums, and Commercial Complexes
   • Cyber-Physical Security of the Critical Infrastructure
   • Standards and Interoperability of Equipment and Systems
   • Communication Solutions for Smart Grids and Smart Cities
   • Flexibility in Power Systems
   • Energy Storage ​Systems – Applications and Business cases
   • 250 Million Smart Meters in India – Rollout Strategies and Business Models
5. Disruptive Innovations for Utilities
   • Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Robotics
   • Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Mixed Reality Technologies for the Smart Grids and Smart Cities
   • Web 3.0 and Metaverse for Utilities
   • Wearable Devices
   • Blockchain Applications for Utilities
   • Robotic Process Automation (RPA) for Utilities
   • “Paper-less” and “Contact-less” Operations of Utilities
   • Digitalization, New Services and Revenue ​Streams
   • Voice of the Customer – What the Digital Customers Wants?
   • Customer Engagement Strategies and social media for Utilities​ – Customer Portal, Chat-bot, Voice-bot​
   • 5G Rollout and its Impact for Smart Grid Technologies
6. Smart Grids for Smart Cities
   • Common Automation and IT Layer for Smart City Infrastructure Domains
   • Unlocking the Value of Street Light Poles for Multiple Smart City Applications
   • Smart Home and Smart Appliances
   • Smart Grid as Anchor Infrastructure for Smart Cities
   • Smart Energy Communities
   • Distributed Generation
   • Combined Billing and Customer Care Systems for all Utilities in a Smart City
   • Common GIS Map for all Domains in a Smart City
   • Digital Twins
7. New and Emerging Technologies and Trends
   • DG Set Replacement with Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS)
   • Green Hydrogen
   • District Cooling System
   • Electric Cooking
   • Grid Interactive Buildings and Campuses
   • Urban Air Mobility Systems (UAM)
8. Regulations for the Evolving Smart Energy Systems ​
   • 100% Renewables
   • Flexibility Solutions
   • Retail Competition
   • Green Power Markets
   • Ancillary Services
9. Smart Water  
   • Smart ​Solutions for Water Production, Transmission, and Distribution
   • Smart Technologies to Address India’s Urban Water Crisis
10. Smart City Gas Distribution 
    • Solutions for Gas Transmission and Distribution Networks
11. Cyber Security for the Digitalized Grids

ISGAN Virtual Learning invites to this webinar on the findings of three and a half years experience on European R&I projects: INTERRFACE and CoordiNet. These projects have been investigating the best ways for TSO-DSO coordination with regards to flexibility procurement. The project will provide recommendations to developing flexibility markets in Europe based on the experience from the different large-scale demonstrations across Europe.

Watch the webinar recordings

Speakers

Konstantinos Kotsalos (INTERRFACE)
Sebastian Vogel (CoordiNet)
Moderates
Gianluca Lipari (OneNet)

Intended audience

Students and researchers interested in power networks, policy makers working on electricity markets, utilities, regulators, industries and consumers with the potential to provide flexibility.

Key messages

Flexibility can be an important tool for system operators to optimise the use of the grid while ensuring security of supply and accelerating the penetration of renewables in the electricty network. Improved coordination among energy stakeholders incuding TSOs, DSOs, FSPs (BSPs/BRPs) and consumers plays a fundamental role in achieving the uptake of market-based flexibility solutions as part of the energy transition. Through their extensive collaboration, the INTERRFACE and CoordiNet projects have defined a set of tools necessary to overcome the challenges faced by market stakeholders, and will present their joint recommendations for paving the way towards harmonised flexibility markets in Europe.

Further information

CoordiNet deliverables:

https://coordinet.netlify.app/publications/deliverables

INTERRFACE deliverables:

http://www.interrface.eu/public-deliverables

ISGAN Academy invites to to this webinar that addresses the question of an optimal design of a cross-voltage level network operation, which takes into account an efficient use of flexibility resources.
We invite experts from the international projects DA/RE, OneNet, Redispatch 3.0 and CoordiNet, to shed light and discuss the topic TSO-DSO-Consumer coordination in today’s power system operation.

Watch the webinar recordings

Speakers

Julia Strahlhoff (DA/RE)
Jirapa Kamsamrong (Redispatch 3.0)
Yvonne Ruwaida (CoordiNet)
Gwen Willeghems (OneNet)
Ferdinando Bosco (OneNet)
Matteo Troncia (OneNet)
Moderates
Jose Pablo Chaves Avila

Intended audience

Academia, researchers, distribution system operators, transmission system operators, engineers, flexibility providers, ISGAN working groups 3, 6 and 9.

Key messages

The presentation serves to introduce current projects on the topic of TSO-DSO coordination. To show various ways of looking at the described topic different needs for coordination will be shown and various designs of coordination are discussed.  Possible results from this are the identification of differences or similarities regarding the level at which optimization takes place as well as different assumptions on market design, access to the coordinated resources and data management.

Further information

Dare Plattform

OneNet Project

Redispatch 3.0

Coordinet Project

Energy Transition and Circular Economy-related regulations are popping up around the world. Both energy efficiency and material efficiency are to be optimised. In electrical applications it is not always apparent how a trade-off between these goals can be avoided. The sustainable peak load concept for public distribution transformers does exactly that: it is beneficial to transformer energy efficiency as well as material efficiency, with no need for compromise.

This webinar will present the concept, several case studies, a thorough transformer loading survey carried out in US and a modelling exercise for the EU.

Speakers

Angelo Baggini Aggregate professor of electrical engineering at the University of Bergamo Chairman of Cenelec TC14 Chairman of CEI TC97 Over 200 technical and scientific papers Author of PQ Handbook (2008) and Electrical Energy Efficiency (2012), both published by Wiley and Sons
Alberto Cracco Managing and Sales Director, Westrafo Srl. Graduated as a management engineer at the University of Padua MBA 16 years of experience in the transformer industry
Bruno De Wachter Free-lance engineer-copywriter and consultant with focus on the energy sector Degree in Electrical Engineering (University of Ghent) A post-master’s in European Languages and their Literature (University of Antwerp). In-house consultant and copywriter for the European Copper Institute since 2011
Phil Hopkinson President and CEO of Hvolt Inc. Life Fellow IEEE Long-time member of IEEE Transformer Committee Holder of 15 US patents Technical Adviser to the USNC for Power Transformers, IEC TC 14 56 years of experience in the transformer industry (design, engineering and management)
Fernando Nuño Clean Energy Transition Programme Manager at the European Copper Institute Leads multiple publicly funded EU Horizon projects. Energy Engineer (Bilbao) ENSPM school (France) Experience at the French Energy Regulatory Commission and in the automotive sector
Alan Sbravati Global Customers Application Manager, Cargill 20 years of experience in the US transformer industry Dozens of publications on transformers Active member of IEEE Transformer Committee

Intended audience

Policy makers, distribution system operators, utilities, electricity market regulators, academia, consultants, transformer manufacturers, transformer value chain.

Key messages

• The total annual energy losses of a sustainable peak load unit are similar to those of a conventional unit. This is due to the fact that the average loading in public distribution networks is low, resulting in a higher relative importance of no-load losses compared to load losses.
• The material savings potential of sustainable peak load transformers is substantial, with reductions in total weight of 11 – 15%.
• The purchase cost of a sustainable peak load transformer is comparable to that of a conventional transformer if all other parameters are kept the same.

Further information

https://help.leonardo-energy.org/hc/en-us/articles/4409606711570–Cu0277-Maximizing-distribution-transformer-resource-efficiency-Potential-contribution-to-EU-Green-Deal-objectives

https://www.powertransformernews.com/2021/12/13/the-sustainable-peak-load-concept-and-public-distribution-transformers/

https://ee-ip.org/en/article/integrating-energy-and-material-efficiency-in-public-distribution-transformers-6317

The demonstration led by ELES in the OSMOSE project demonstrated the possibility of cross-border flexibility activation near-to-real time while comlying with grid limitations.

The near real-time potential of flexibility of hydro producers was explored: new tools were developed and live demonstrated to estimate their remaining flexibility 15 min before delivery time.

The processes implemented resulted in a real cross-border activation thanks to a selection of bids every 5 minutes and an activation signal sent every 10 seconds.

Join the webinar: 2022-04-21 at h 13:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Gorazd Ažman, ELES	Andrea Bello, HDE	Miran Kavrečić, HSE
Dusan Vlaisavljevic, EKC	Marilena Lazzaro, ENG	Charles Payement, RTE

Intended audience

Junior engineers; students; researchers; utilities; regulators; policymakers;

Further information

https://www.osmose-h2020.eu/ 

The Italian demo of OSMOSE project tested different kinds of flexibility solutions in a 9 month long experimentation on a real HV grid portion: one of this is the flexibility from the grid itself! By exploiting accurate load and generation forecasts and cost effective Dynamic Thermal Rating solutions, a new Energy Management System was developed in order to detect and solve efficiently congestions in a 3 hours ahead horizon.

Join the webinar: 2022-04-07 at h 13:00 CEST (UTC+1)

Speakers

• Leonardo Petrocchi (Terna)
• Giuseppe Lisciandrello (Terna)
• Dario Ronzo (RSE)
• Davide Poli (ENSIEL)
• Alfredo Vaccaro (ENSIEL)

Key messages

Capital-light investments and prediction algorhitm can enhance existing assets exploitation, becoming an efficient add-on to standard infrastructural planning of the grid.

Intended audience

TSOs, academy, industry

Further information

https://www.osmose-h2020.eu/ 

The speakers will lead you towards two demonstration activities part of the OSMOSE project concerning off-the-shelf inverters interfacing energy storage systems with the power grid that can be turned into grid-forming units through suitable control upgrades in order to provide several services to the power system when it hosts massive amount of inverter-based renewable/stochastic generation. This is achieved thanks to the provision of synchronisation services superposed to classic regulation ones.

Join the webinar: 2022-04-05 at h 13:00 CEST (UTC+1)

Speakers

Carmen Cardozo (RTE R&D)	Mario Paolone (EPFL)	Markel Zubiaga (Ingeteam R&D)

Key messages

Within the context of service provision to future power systems hosting massive amount of inverter-based renewable/stochastic generation, 2 demonstrators have shown that grid forming capability can be provided from off-the-shelf equipment. One demonstration is based on a existing MW-class BESS connected to the medium voltage grid of the EPFL campus, while the other was built for the OSMOSE project by Ingeteam and connecter to the RTE network.

• Both demos proved that grid forming capability can be provided without hardware oversizing, drawing out the most of existing equipment and therefore limiting the cost.
• A hybrid system showed that supercapacitors installed on the DC side can handled all fast transients induced by grid forming control, therefore smoothing the battery output power.
• The controls have been improved to behave properly in different grid conditions including harmonics and unbalanced conditions.
• Multiservices provision can be done including grid forming capability taking into account the unit’s operational constraints.
• Accurate distribution-class PMUs can be used to assess the performance of grid forming vs grid following units.

Intended audience

This webinar is mainly suitable for transmission system operators (TSO), energy providers, converter manufacturers and researchers in the field of power electronics and/or power systems stability and control. The content of the webinar is also comprehensible for students and engineers with some background in the power systems dynamics.

Further information

https://www.osmose-h2020.eu/ 

Register now for the 8th edition of ISUW22 !

ISUW 2022 has been scheduled from 01 – 05 March 2022, an International Conference and Exhibition on Smart Energy and Mobility for Smarter Cities.

The Exhibition Booths at ISUW 2022 will offer never before experience to exhibitors and visitors. ISUW 2022 will bring together India’s leading Electricity, Gas and Water Utilities, Policy Makers, Regulators, Investors and world’s top- notch Smart Energy Experts and Researchers to discuss trends, share best practices and showcase next generation technologies and products in smart energy and smart cities domains. ISUW 2022 will include plenaries, interactive workshops, keynotes, technical sessions and technical paper presentations. Bi-lateral Smart Grid workshop with EU, USA, Switzerland, Sweden, France, Canada are also expected to be a part of the upcoming edition.

For more details about ISUW 2022, please visit www.isuw.in.

IEC standards are essential to ensure a successful industrial uptake of innovative smart grid solutions, however further research and innovation are requested in order to develop standardized descriptions of innovative components.

This webinar introduces the activities performed in the OSMOSE project regarding the engineering process and the functional tests performed on a dedicated demonstrator, based on the international standard IEC 61850.  It addresses in particular the following questions aspects:

• Engineering process: configuration of the system, having devices from different manufacturers
• Results of functional tests: validation of the system configuration.

Join the webinar: 2022-01-28 at h 13:00 CET (UTC+1)

Speakers

Thomas Sterckx	Camille Bloch	Christoph Brunner	João Saragoça	Jörg Reuter

Key messages

IEC standards are essential to ensure a successful industrial uptake of innovative smart grid solutions, however further research and innovation actions are requested in order to to develop standardized descriptions of innovative components.

The proposed webinar describe the activities performed by OSMOSE partners during the engineering process and functional tests performed in WP7.1 and the contributions that these activities had provided to the development of IEC 61850 standards.

Intended audience

Very large audience from TSO, to DSO, DER project developers, components manufacturers and selected and invited external stakeholders (e.g.: ENTSO-E; T&D Europe, etc.)

Readings

1. Related web page on project website: www.osmose-h2020.eu/project-overview/wp7/
2. Deliverable link: https://www.osmose-h2020.eu/download/d7-1-iec61850-entso-e-profile-introduction-and-engineering-process-refinement/

Thank you to everyone who attended the first ISGAN-GSEF Joint webinar on “System Challenges and Opportunities in Electric Vehicle Integration with the Grid”.
It is now available by recorded video on the ISGAN YouTube channel!

ISGAN Academy invites to to the fifth episode of the Smart4RES webinar series. The webinar will provide an industrial view on the problematic and role of storage and a discussion on utilities needs and expectation through addressing the different Smart4RES use cases. The webinar will also focus on the joint optimization and dispatch of RES power plants and storage topic through different angles.
Finally, a presentation of the work done by ICCS will focus on the dispatch of RES and storage in isolated power systems including storage ancillary services and frequency security.

More info on www.smart4res.eu

Join the webinar: 2021-12-09 at h 12:00 CET (UTC+1)

Speakers

Maria Inês Marques EDP NEW R&D	Simon Camal MINES ParisTech/ARMINES – Centre PERSEE	Dimitrios Lagos ICCS

Key messages

1. Electrochemical batteries constraints and what EDP foresees for future (coupling storage and renewables).
2. Importance of modelling in assets management, maintenance and lifecycle.
3. Combination of technologies, presenting VPP to the market instead of physical ones.
4. Multi-objective optimization for RES and storage offer interpretable results to stakeholders who want to participate in multiple electricity markets.
5. Data-driven trading solutions simplify the modelling chain of trading decisions.
6. Necessary ancillary services for storage systems in non-interconnected island systems with high RES penetration.
7. Dispatch of thermal units, RES and storage in non-interconnected island systems considering the frequency security and the ancillary services provided by storage devices.

Intended audience

• International
• TSOs/DSOs
• Storage system industrials
• RES producers, aggregators, grid operators
• RES traders
• Academia, Regulation bodies

Readings

1. Smart4res website
2. Forecasting and optimization of ancillary services provision by renewable energy sources.
3. Smart4RES: Towards next generation forecasting tools of renewable energy production.

The initiative aims to step up global climate action and uptake of clean energy models. Pilot projects will provide an opportunity to gain on-the-ground insights, test new approaches and disseminate learnings that will feed into the IEA’s Digital Demand-Driven Electricity Networks (3DEN) Initiative, which focuses on the policy, regulatory, technology and investment context needed to accelerate progress on power system modernisation and effective utilisation of demand-side resources.

25 October webinar: The webinar will be an opportunity for the public and private sector to learn more about the call for proposals. Proposals are expected to showcase innovative business and regulatory models for the uptake of smarter digital power infrastructure. Information shared will include the terms of reference for pilot projects, application process and timeline, and selection criteria.

This webinar introduces the Dynamic Virtual Power Plant (DVPP) concept under development by the European Commission funded project POSYTYF, that aims to facilitate Renewable Energy Sources (RES) integration into the electrical network. After an overall project presentation, the webinar will introduce the proposed DVPP concept and detail the first project deliverable: the definition and specification of DVPP scenarios.

More info on https://posytyf-h2020.eu/

Join the webinar: 2021-11-18 at h 15:00 CET (UTC+1)

Key messages

1. The new DVPP concept fully integrates the dynamic aspects at all levels: locally (for each RES generator), globally (for grid ancillary services and interaction with other neighbour elements of the grid) and economically (for internal optimal dispatch and participation to electricity markets)
2. A DVPP is a set of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) along with a set of control and operation procedures. This means methodologies for:
   • choosing the participating RES, optimal and continuous operation as a whole (especially in case of loss of natural resources – e.g., wind, sun – on a part of the DVPP),
   • regulation (in the dynamic sense) to ensure local objectives for each generator,
   • participation to ancillary services of the DVPP as a unit and to diminish negative effects of interaction with neighbour dynamics elements of the power system,
   • integration in both actual power systems scenarios (with mixed classic and power electronics-based generation) and future ones with high degree of RES penetration.

Intended audience

• Power system engineers, from students to senior experts.

Speakers

Bogdan Marinescu Ecole Centrale Nantes	Oriol Gomis Bellmunt Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya	Carlos Collados Rodriguez Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya

Speakers Bio

Bogdan Marinescu was born in 1969 in Bucharest, Romania. He received the Engineering degree from the Polytechnical Institute of Bucharest in 1992, the PhD from Université Paris Sud-Orsay, France in 1997 and the “Habilitation à diriger des recherches” from Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan, France in 2010. He is currently a Professor in Ecole Centrale Nantes and LS2N laboratory where he is the Head of the chair “Analysis and control of power grids”  (2014-2024) and the Coordinator of the European project POSYTYF (Research & Innovation Action, 2020-2023). In the first part of his carrier, he was active in R&D divisions of industry (EDF and RTE) and as a part-time professor (especially from 2006 to 2012 in Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan). His main fields of interest are the theory and applications of linear systems, robust control and power systems engineering.

Oriol Gomis-Bellmunt received the degree in industrial engineering from the School of Industrial Engineering of Barcelona (ETSEIB), Technical University of Catalonia (UPC), Barcelona, Spain, in 2001 and the doctoral degree in electrical engineering from the UPC in 2007. In 1999, he joined Engitrol SL where he worked as Project Engineer in the automation and control industry. Since 2004, he has been with the Electrical Engineering Department of the UPC where he is Professor and participates in the CITCEA-UPC Research Group. He is involved in a number of research projects in national and international consortiums (medium-long term research oriented) and technology transfer projects with several manufacturers, operators and developers worldwide (short-term research and practical application). His research interests are focused on the understanding of modern power systems, based on power electronics (HVDC, FACTS, energy storage and renewables) and grid integration of renewable energy, especially onshore and offshore wind and solar photovoltaics. Since 2020, he is an ICREA Academia researcher. Since 2021, he is IEEE Fellow.

Carlos Collados-Rodriguez received the Bachelor’s degree in Energy Engineering and the Master’s degree in Industrial Engineering from the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC), Barcelona, Spain, in 2014 and 2017 respectively. He joined CITCEA-UPC research group in 2013, where he is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering. His research interests include power converters, HVDC systems, grid integration of renewable energy and power system analysis, especially in power-electronics-dominated power systems.

Readings

1. B. Marinescu, O. Gomis-Bellmunt, F. Dörfler, H. Schulte, L. Sigrist, Dynamic Virtual Power Plant: A New Concept for Grid Integration of Renewable Energy Sources, https://arxiv.org/abs/2108.00153.

2. Deliverable 1.1 when publicly released: Definition and specification of Dynamic Virtual Power Plant (DVPP) scenarios.

In most low-carbon scenarios, EV integration is a critical vector for the decarbonisation of the transport sector. However, effective EV integration presents various high-stakes technical challenges for distribution network operators that must be resolved for that promise to be realized at a speed and scale consistent with global climate and clean energy objectives.

This open event will bring together ongoing and upcoming ISGAN and GSEF’s work looking at EV integration. The discussion will focus on essential policy support, technical issues of EV, and cross-sectoral approaches.

Date : 27th October 2021

Time : 08:00-10:00 New York | 14:00-16:00 Paris | 17:30-19:30 New Delhi | 21:00-23:00 Seoul

During this meeting it is planned to discuss the future strategy of ISGAN on its way into its third period. Possible restructuring and the new legal framework will be addressed. The latest results of all nine ISGAN Annexes will be presented and discussions on the next steps for cooperation with other organisations are planned.

For any inquiry regarding the ISGAN and the ExCo21 meeting, please contact the ISGAN Secretariat at ISGAN[at]ait.ac.at.

Since 2014, ISGAN has recognised and showcased the leadership and innovation of more than 40 distinguished smart grid projects through an annual ISGAN Award of Excellence competitions each with a special focus.

The 7th ISGAN Award of Excellence recognizes exemplars in the field of smart grids with a special focus on “Future-Proofing the Grid Operation via Advanced Digitalisation and IoT”.

The ceremony of its award competition will take place at the 12th Clean Energy Ministerial on 2 June 2021.

Auditorium, 19:25-19:55 CEST, Wednesday 2 June 2021

*After being broadcast in the Auditorium, the recorded ceremony will be accessible through the On-Demand section. 

Participants will get first hand information about

• related activities in Austria, Canada, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands and Finland, and
• policy messages to the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM).

In the second part experts and practitioners will discuss

• how new projects on Smart Energy Systems can learn from this and
• how the insights can help to upscale their projects in regulatory sandboxes; and
• which insights are there and what do they mean to all the (new) actors in the SES world?

Building on the first initiative on Experimental Sandboxes (in 2019), ISGAN has organized a series of interactive knowledge transfer workshops and accompanying activities on maximizing learning from and by Regulatory Sandboxes and other Regulatory Experimenting programs for Smart Energy Systems.
This is based the policy messages sent to the Clean Energy Ministerial conference taking place in Chile from 31 May to 6 June 2021.

CEM being the high-level global forum of energy ministers of 28 countries (plus European Union) to encourage the transition to a global clean energy economy.

Join the webinar: 2021-06-10 at h 14:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Helena Lindquist	Klaus Kubeczko	Magnus Olofsson
Dierk Bauknecht	Nicole Kerhof

Intended audience

• International decision-makers from the energy sector and the power system industry
• RES producers, aggregators, grid operators, and traders
• Academia
• Regulatory bodies

Join the webinar: 2021-06-09 at h 13:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Matthias Lange, EMSYS	Simon Camal, ARMINES
Pierre Pinson, DTU

Intended audience

Senior Engineers and researchers in power systems

Energy economics & regulation experts

Join the webinar: 2021-05-27 at h 14:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Florian Boehnke	Maxime Laasri
Sandrine Bortolotti	Christoph Weber

Intended audience

Non experts but potential users of the standard, from TSO, DSO, DER project developers, to components manufacturers.

Key messages

• The IEC61850 is an international standard defining rules and guidelines for substation protection and automation system communication, configuration and testing, supported by a data model and a configuration language.
• The IEC61850 standard provides an engineering process to allow efficient device configuration.
• Osmose provides and demonstrates the required extensions for engineering process extensions to support an efficient top-down end-to-end engineering process from concept and specification to configuration.
• Osmose provides recommendations for IEC61850 WG10 in order to integrate the projects developments into a future release of the standard.

Questions

• Have you ever heard of the IEC61850 standard?
• Are you applying it in your substations?
• How do you go from specification to IED configuration? Do you consider this as an efficient process?
• Where do you believe improvements on engineering processes can be made?
• Where do you believe improvements on the IEC61850 standard can be made?

Join the webinar: 2021-05-03 at h 15:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Yves Marie Bourien	Thomas Sterckx
Christoph Brunner	Camille Bloch

Intended audience

Academy members from the power systems and meteorological areas, forecasting services providers, renewable plant operators and market traders, and widely TSOs, DSOs and regulators.

Key messages

• A huge amount of observations (radiometers, ceilometers, sky images, satellites as well as solar plants) are used to derive solar nowcasts as well as the initial state of the atmosphere used by improved numerical weather models. The evolution of which is then predicted by NWP and LES.
• For solar power prediction, both observations from the ground and from satellite are used, mostly to identify clouds and predict the displacement over time and space as well as their impact on solar radiation.
• Smart4RES develops complementary methods to blend information from multiple source of data and to propose novel approaches towards a seamless view of RES forecasting at various temporal and spatial granularity levels.
• As an example, Smart4RES new approach to data assimilation combines the best of the observations with the best of the physical models to produce optimized temporal and spatial irradiance maps and forecasts. Such detail can be useful for the optimized operation of solar power plants and grids with significant solar power penetration.

Join the webinar: 2021-04-29 at h 13:00 CEST (UTC+2)

Speakers

Bijan Nouri	Annette Hammer

Intended audience

Academy members from the power systems and meteorological areas, forecasting services providers, renewable plant operators and market traders, and widely TSOs, DSOs and regulators.

Key messages

• RES are sensitive to high-frequency and very localized variations of the atmospheric flow (wind guts, cloud shadows, fog occcurrence etc.)

• Refining parameterizations used in NWP models is the first step to improve RES prediction
• Getting rid of these parameterizations, for instance using Large-Eddy Simulations (LES), is a promising venue because it allows to resolve most of these small-scale fluctuations

• The spectacular growth in computing power using GPUs now enable LES based weather prediction below 100m resolution. This is fine enough to resolve the effects of wind turbines, low clouds and turbulence.
• Using ensemble simulations translates atmospheric state inherent unpredictability into a probabilistic view
• The spectacular growth in computing power using GPUs now enable LES based weather prediction below 100m resolution. This is fine enough to resolve the effects of wind turbines, low clouds and turbulence.
• A fourth webinar scheduled in April will complete this webinar on Advanced weather forecasting for RES applications and present how observations data can be used, together with measurements from RES plants, as input to dedicated RES forecasting models to predict the power output of these plants.

Matthias Lange                              Remco Verzijlbergh         Quentin Libois

Intended audience:

• Transmission System Operators (TSOs)  
• Regional Security Coordinators (RSCs) 
• Market operators  
• Energy producers, traders and energy market actors 
• Policy makers and regulation bodies 
• Transmission and Distribution (T&D) equipment and services industry 
• Academia and engineering communities 

Anastasis Tzoumpas                Katerina Drivakou                    Thanasis Bachoumis

As ISGAN enters its second decade, this meeting represents an important milestone for this Clean Energy Ministerial initiative and IEA Technology Collaboration Programme. The ExCo will consider ISGAN’s updated strategic plan as its prepares to submit the formal request for a third term (2022-2027).  The FY2021 Programmes of Work of all eight active ISGAN Annexes will be presented.  The results from the tendering process for a new Secretariat will be presented and the corresponding selection taken.  Breakout sessions will allow for more detailed discussions on core ISGAN themes and their definitions and on the next steps for cooperation with outside organisations. Lastly, the ExCo will discuss known and potential deliverables to the 12^th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM12, June 2021) and other major events.

For any inquiry regarding the ISGAN and the ExCo21 meeting, please contact the ISGAN Secretariat at ISGAN@ait.ac.at.

Save the Date! The twelfth Clean Energy Ministerial hosted by the Government of Chile will be held in the week commencing 31 May 2021.

It will be a virtual event and will provide opportunities for the global CEM community to organize insightful, impactful clean energy events throughout the week.

Further details to follow in 2021.

As a participant in the full workshop, you will have the opportunity to learn from the latest findings on activities related to demonstrations taking place internationally. Through discussions and collaborative sessions, you will also have the change to contribute to a whitepaper highlighting concepts presented and encouraging future study implementation to provide support for effective policy development.

This workshop will be hosted in the following segments:

1. December 2020: Pre-recorded presentations are available on the ISGAN YouTube Channel for you to view online before attending the next workshop segments
2. January 13, 2021 from 14:00 – 16:30 CET / 8:00 – 10:30 EST / 18:30 – 21:00 IST: Join a live 2-hour online discussion amongst speakers and participants for a) Q&A session with the speaker and b) open group discussion for drafting the outline of a whitepaper that highlights the potential and encourages future study and implementation.
3. 2021/2022: Join an in-person (as circumstances allow) meeting with international ISGAN and annex 6 members as well as Canadian experts from the smart grids community, attached to another event in Canada will focus on finalizing and launching the whitepaper.

The online workshop is free of charge but we strongly encourage interested participants to register to receive reminders and updates as this workshop and its related deliverables progress.

List of Presentations:

Introductions

• Introduction to ISGAN Annex 6: Transmission and Distribution Systems – Joni Rossi, RISE / ISGAN Annex 6 Operating Agent (Sweden)

Theme A: Potential of Flexibility Resources

• Flexibility Potential in Local Energy Systems – Anjali Wadhera, Natural Resources Canada (Canada)

• Local Power Balancing for Advancing Power System Flexibility – Narayana Prasad Padhy, India Institute of Technology Roorkee (India)

Theme B: Bringing Flexibility Together

• IESO York Region Non Wires Alternatives Demonstration Project – Pat Lo,  Independent Electricity System Operator of Ontario (Canada)

• Transactive Electric Distribution System – Bala Venkatesh, Ryerson University (Canada)

• “Enabling flexibilities for future power systems: Synergies from EU and Canadian collaborative activities” by Magnus Andersson – IMCG Sweden, Anh Tuan Le – Chalmers University of Technology and Kankar Bhattacharya – University of Waterloo.

• Green Button and London Hydro Pilots – Syed Mir, London Hydro (Canada)

Theme C: Market Policies and Planning Approaches

• The Role of DSOs in a Decentralised Future – Randolf Brazier, Energy Networks Association (United Kingdom)

• Local Market Designs for Maximizing Social Benefits (Survey Results) – Orlando Valarezo, Universidad Pontificia Comillas (Spain)

• Why getting flexibility from distribution grids? Possible solutions and regulatory issues – Gianluigi Migliavacca, Ricerca sul Sistema Energetico (Italy)

Further information about the event will be distributed to the registered persons shortly before the event. For all enquiries regarding the event, please contact steven.wong[at]canada.ca or joni.rossi[at]ri.se.

Intended audience

• Decision-makers from the energy sector and the power system industry (operators of power systems, energy producers, market regulators, energy traders, etc.)
• Senior engineers with experience in renewable energy or statistics / data science
• Data providers, data science companies, grid operators
• RES traders
• Academia, Regulation bodies

Liyang Han                               Ricardo Bessa

10th Nov 2020 @ 14:00 CEST

Duration: 1 hour

The targeted audience of the webinar is:

The intended audience from in this webinar includes: academy members from the power systems area and industry players also from power systems including TSOs, DSOs, policy makers, regulators, research centers and associations focused in grid management and grid planning.

Key messages:

Flexibility plays a key-role in the decarbonisation of power systems and in increasing the involvement of end-users through the creation of innovative demand-side services.

INTERPRETER will develop an open-source interoperable grid management solution consisting of a set of 10 software applications for an optimal design, planning, operation and maintenance of the electricity grid, with a special focus on the distribution network.

ATTEST aims to develop a secure ICT platform that integrates a set of optimization tools for operating, planning and managing assets of power systems.

INTERRFACE aims to create a common architecture that connects market platforms to establish a seamless pan-European electricity exchange linking wholesale and retail markets and allows all electricity market players to trade and procure energy services in a transparent, non-discriminatory way.

André Guimarães                                                George Boultadakis             Hans Bludszuweit

6th Nov 2020 @ 14:00 CEST

Duration: 1 hour

The targeted audience of the webinar is:

Academy members, from the power systems area and industry players also from power systems including TSOs, DSOs, policy makers, regulators, research centers and associations focused in grid management and grid planning.  

Key messages:

Flexibility plays a key-role in the decarbonisation of power systems (e.g. by promoting the integration of DER or enabling new TSO/DSO coordination strategies) and RD&I projects contribute to the European leadership in the power system industry by developing related solutions. 

INTERPRETER will develop an open-source interoperable grid management solution consisting of a set of 10 software applications for an optimal design, planning, operation and maintenance of the electricity grid, with a special focus on the distribution network. 

FlexPlan aims at establishing a new grid planning methodology considering the opportunity to introduce new storage and flexibility resources in electricity transmission and distribution grids as an alternative to building new grid elements. 

CoordiNet aims to demonstrate how DSOs and TSOs by acting in a coordinated manner can provide favourable cooperation conditions to all actors while removing barriers to participation for customers and small market players connected to distribution networks 

Nuno Amaro                                Gianluigi Migliavacca                                  José Pablo Chaves

On behalf of the CEM11 pre-event organizers (ISGAN and PSF), we invite you to the ISGAN-PSF joint workshop “A holistic approach to low emission energy systems through the sector integration” on Wednesday 16 September, 14:30 – 16:00 CET (15:30 -17:00 Riyadh).

Clean Energy Ministerial 11 (CEM11) hosted this year by Saudi Arabia, will be entirely virtual and open to all via live webcast.
​
This workshop will bring together ongoing and upcoming CEM work from various perspectives, looking at power system integration enabled by digitalization and new technologies for power system flexibility – such as electric mobility and distributed storage. The focus of the discussion will be on key policy support, including market design, multi-stakeholder coordination, cross-sectoral approaches. From CEM, this includes the Power System Flexibility Campaign, the International Smart Grid Action Network (ISGAN) and the work of the Horizontal Accelerator for EV Integration. Also, during the event, the winning projects of the Sixth ISGAN Award of Excellence will be announced. (Please find more details in the attached PDF file.)

​
* How to join the event:

Please visit the CEM11-MI5 event website and register www.cem-mi-saudi2020.sa. You will be sent an access code the platform which will let you log in to the virtual conference, select your avatar to wander around the virtual venue, go to the chat room to network, and go to your side event room.

The session will be broadcast live through this link also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS6IyRgUutY&feature=youtu.be 

Online workshop “Testing Methods and Certification Protocols”

Will take place on 15 October 2020.

SIRFN will present its advanced work on testing and validation of smart grid systems. The following topics will be covered:

• automated testing of distributed generators
• holistic validation considerations of energy systems
• validations procedures of microgrid functions
• modern laboratory testing technologies.

Further information about the event will be distributed to the registered persons shortly before the event.
For all enquiries regarding the event, please contact sirfn[at]der-lab.net.

5 jun 2020 @ 14:00 CEST

Duration: 1 hour

The targeted audience of the webinar is:

• decision-makers from the energy sector and and the power system industry (operators of power systems, energy producers, market regulators, energy traders, etc.)
• senior engineers with experience in renewable energy or statistics / data science.

Key messages of webinar:

• Collaborative forecasts enable the distributed optimization of energy transactions by multiple actors of power systems, yielding value through data markets while preserving data privacy.
• High-resolution forecasts give tailored information on the uncertainty of RES production sites, thanks to advanced weather predictions and cutting-edge data science.
• Artificial Intelligence teams up with human expertise to exploit the big data available on RES production and power systems to optimize decision-making for market applications and grid management.
• Synergies between RES and storage systems are optimized and validated in practice on various contexts, from a large RES power plant to an entire isolated power system.

George Kariniotakis                 Pierre Pinson

Presenters:

Ricardo Prata                             Rafael Cossent                          Ricardo Bessa

Apr 23, 2020 02:00 PM in Brussels

Duration: 1h

Smart grid initiatives generate wide range impacts which are not captured by the traditional monetary analysis.

Broader and more general assessment tools are required for estimating the actual smart grid potential.

The use of an approach which combines the Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) for the monetary impacts and the Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) for non-monetary impacts is promising to increase the accuracy of the assessment of smart grid initiatives.

As a part of ISGAN activities, the smartgrideval software is proposed a as decision support tool in the context of smart grid assessment.

Fabrizio Pilo                 Matteo Troncia

India Smart Grid Forum (ISGF) has been organising its flagship annual event, India Smart Grid Week (ISGW) since 2015 and it is considered as one of the top five international events on Smart Grids and Smart Cities. With launching of 100 smart city projects by the Government of India, water and city gas distribution utilities will also need to equip themselves with latest technologies for improved operational efficiency and successful integration into the smart city systems. However, lack of effective policy and regulations both at the central and state level along with inadequate safety guidelines, standards, business models act as barriers for its growth. In order to address all the challenges and to discuss future technologies and opportunities, we have transformed the India Smart Grid Week (ISGW) to India Smart Utility Week (ISUW) in 2019. From the overwhelming feedbacks we received, ISUW 2019 was an astounding success, attended by over 1800 + delegates and 288 speakers from 41 countries.

ISUW 2020 will be organised as an International Conference and Exhibition on Smart Energy and smart mobility for Smarter Cities. ISUW 2020 will bring together India’s leading Electricity, Gas and Water Utilities, Policy Makers, Regulators, Investors and world’s top-notch Smart Energy Experts and Researchers to discuss trends, share best practices and showcase next generation technologies and products in smart energy and smart cities domains. ISUW 2020 will include plenaries, keynotes, interactive workshops, high level roundtables and technical sessions on variety of topics.

ISGW 2019 Post Event Report can be viewed at link: http://indiasmartgrid.org/reports/…

ISUW 2020 is planned from 03 – 07 March 2020 in New Delhi – see also: http://www.isuw.in/

27 Feb 2020 @ 14:00 CET

Duration: 1h

In this webinar it will discuss the need to model coupled energy systems in a single framework and we will introduce encoord’s Scenario Analysis Interface for Energy Systems (SAInt), a software application to model, plan, and operate coupled energy networks.

Dr. Carlo Brancucci                Dr. Kwabena Pambour

Thursday, December 5th, 2019 from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM CET

The CoordiNet project aims at demonstrating how Distribution System Operators (DSO) and Transmission System Operators (TSO) shall act in a coordinated manner to procure and activate grid services in the most reliable and efficient way through the implementation of three large-scale demonstrations. The CoordiNet project is centred around three key objectives:

1. To demonstrate to which extent coordination between TSO/DSO will lead to a more economic, more reliable and more environmentally friendly electricity supply to the consumers through the implementation of three demonstrations at large scale, in cooperation with market participants.
2. To define and test a set of standardized products and the related key parameters for grid services, including the reservation and activation process for the use of the assets and finally the settlement process.
3. To specify and develop a TSO-DSO-Consumers cooperation platform starting with the necessary building blocks for the demonstration sites. These components will pave the way for the interoperable development of a pan-European market that will allow all market participants to provide energy services and opens up new revenue streams for consumers providing grid services.

In total, eight demo activities will be carried out in three different countries, namely Greece, Spain, and Sweden.

Speakers:

Wednesday, November 6, 2019 from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM CET

See links for presentation and recording from the webinar.

Power system flexibility relates to the ability of the power system to manage changes.

Solutions providing advances in flexibility are of utmost importance for the future power system. Development and deployment of innovative technologies, communication and monitoring possibilities, as well as increased interaction and information exchange, are enablers to provide holistic flexibility solutions. Furthermore, development of new methods for market design and analysis, as well as methods and procedures related to system planning and operation, will be required to utilise available flexibility to provide most value to society.

However, flexibility is not a unified term and is lacking a commonly accepted definition.

The flexibility term is used as an umbrella covering various needs and aspects in the power system. This situation makes it highly complex to discuss flexibility in the power system and craves for differentiation to enhance clarity. In this work, the solution has been to differentiate

the flexibility term on needs, and to categorise flexibility needs in four categories.

Here, flexibility needs are considered from over-all system perspectives (stability, frequency and energy supply) and from more local perspectives (transfer capacities, voltage and power quality). With flexibility support considered for both operation and planning of the power system, it is required in a timescale from fractions of a second (e.g. stability and frequency support) to minutes and hours (e.g. thermal loadings and generation dispatch) to months and years (e.g. planning for seasonal adequacy and planning of new investments).

Speakers:

Emil Hillberg (RISE Research Institutes of Sweden)

The transition from a system comprised primarily of dispatch-able generators to a system increasingly reliant on intermittent power sources increases the variability, uncertainty and thus also the need for flexibility.  DERs and “active customers” can provide more flexibility and thus more services to both Distribution System Operators (DSOs) and Transmission System Operators (TSOs).   This shift toward distributed and renewable electricity supply poses challenges to both the TSO and DSO; however, it also encourages exploitation of less utilized coordination synergies to achieve mutual benefits.

The coordination between TSOs and DSOs is of utmost importance for the grid to obtain the full value from services potentially provided by DERs such as, congestion relief, reactive power, voltage control and frequency reserves.

The public workshop will explore the needs, challenges and opportunities of TSO-DSO coordination from a broader perspective accounting for technical, market and regulatory aspects and different views from national/international TSOs, DSOs, and smart grids projects.

The participation is open to the public and free of charge, but a registration is necessary.  Please, register until Friday, 20 September 2019, at https://www.bfeevents.admin.ch/ …

Further Information about the work and outcomes of ISGAN Annex 6 on Power Transmission & Distribution Systems can be found at https://www.iea-isgan.org/our-work/annex-6/.  ETH Zürich is currently contributing to these activities by its own projects as, e.g., TSO-DSO Interaction and T&DFlex.

Monday, July 29, 2019 from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM CEST

The webinar will introduce the physics of Dynamic Line Rating (DLR), and calculation methods based on CIGRE and IEEE standards. Various approaches are discussed: direct measurement technologies (sensors) as well as (weather) model-based simulations. We describe applications implemented by grid operators for some years already. These illustrate how DLR data have been integrated into grid operators’ tools and processes, in particular how forecasts are used.

Furthermore, some analytics will be share that demonstrate the benefits of DLR for reducing OPEX and CAPEX. This includes examples on increasing cross-border trading, reducing investment on new line infrastructure and reducing congestions, which helps to make decisions on reinforcement and investment.

Speakers:

Jean-Louis Repetto (Ampacimon)                                  Rena Kuwahata (Ampacimon)

At InnoGrid 2019 you will hear from the industry’s CEOs on innovation strategies dos and don’ts, discover today’s rising power platforms and debate needed support from regulation, policy and financing. Interactive breakout sessions will get you acquainted with pilots and projects on active system management, sector coupling and storage, advanced grid resilience and innovations for the physical grid.

As at previous editions, a networking exhibition will showcase the works and results of R&D&I projects with a European scope.

see also: https://www.innogrid2020.eu/

Date and time: 2 April 2019, 9:00–16:30
Place: Clarion Sign Hotel, Östra Järnvägsgatan 35, Stockholm, Sweden

• New market opportunities enabled by digitalization of the power sector
• Flexibility and power system interaction and optimization leveraged by smart grid solutions
• Innovative regulatory approaches to advance smart grids deployment with focus on experimental sandboxes

For online registration and further information, please follow the link

The objective of the project is to take concrete steps forward in regard to identifying key lessons learned and examples of good practice related to the design and implementation of regulatory sandboxes. With this knowledge countries are better placed to create conditions favourable to smart grid investment and deployment. This project is part of a broader scope of activities ISGAN is undertaking along with partner organizations to advance the international dialogue around good practices and new approaches for innovative market and power system design needed to catalyze smart grid investments.

As part of this initiative, ISGAN is gathering smart grid experts from the regulatory, policy making and research communities to participate in a deep-dive international dialogue taking place in conjunction with the ISGAN 17th Executive Committee meeting, during the Stockholm Smart Grid week, 1-5 April 2019.

To learn more, please contact Dr. Magnus Olofsson at magnus.olofsson@energiinstitutet.se.

Prior to the Executive Committee meeting, April 2^nd, 2019, the Swedish Energy Agency and the Swedish Smartgrid Forum would like to invite you to the international public workshop “The future of electricity markets in a low carbon economy”, which will focus on international experiences and lessons learned in relation to several key aspects of power systems transformation, market design and smart grid development. Please find more information in the brochure attached.

On April 1^st, 2019,  you are further cordially invited to attend a full-day Knowledge Transfer Project (KTP) eventon on experimental sandboxes to enable Smart Grid deployment as well as a preparatory workshop for Mission Innovation IC#1 and ISGAN event at CEM10.

To assist you in the planning of your travel, please find attached a first draft of the information package. The agendas of the events and more information on how to register will follow soon.

For any enquiry regarding the ISGAN ExCo meeting, please contact the ISGAN Secretariat at ISGAN@ait.ac.at.

We urge participants that need a visa to enter the Schengen zone to start the application process as soon as possible. If you need a formal letter of invitation, please contact the Swedish Energy Agency, Senja Nordström senja.nordstrom@energimyndigheten.se