CAREER: Energy Storage Systems for Dynamic Reliability of Modern Clean Smart Grid

This NSF CAREER project aims to establish advanced strategies for energy storage systems (ESSs) management to ensure their effective operation and improve system stability and reliability within dynamic electric markets. The project will bring transformative changes in mathematical and control framework and methodology that address the challenges of increasing distributed stochastic components and intricate communication layers in modern power systems. This will be achieved by the development of improved models that fully reflect the dynamics, communication, coordination, and contributions of ESSs in a smart grid. The intellectual merits of the project include the establishment of science and engineering principles for the operation and management of ESSs in the context of dynamic cyber-physical systems to ensure secure and economic power grids, and an education plan to prepare future generations of engineers with the know-how to operate and advance modern systems. The broader impacts of the project reach beyond its research objectives. The project contributes to advancing the nation's energy security by improving the stability, reliability, and environmental sustainability of the U.S. power grids. It also boosts the nation's economy by fostering the growth of energy sectors. The project also commits to contributing to expanding the energy and technology workforce. The project promises a significant educational impact, including new curriculum development, enhancement of graduate and undergraduate research programs, and the creation of new mentorship and career opportunities for students in STEM. The project is motivated by the fact that despite environmental advantages, the rapid integration of renewable energy resources and electric vehicles causes significant challenges to power system stability and reliability. Although these challenges can be tackled by energy storage systems, their evolution is still in the early stages without established standards or management systems. The goals of this project are to i) determine key factors and establish dynamic stability models of energy storage systems to optimize their management to support large-scale renewable energy resources and electric vehicles; ii) develop a composite reliability model of integrated systems in the regulatory market using advanced machine learning techniques. The outcome of this research will contribute to the advancement of fundamental reliability evaluation and energy management approaches and the provision of solution algorithms that can be applied in different research domains. The project would have significant impacts on the operation of smart grids with the targets of multiple economic, technical, environmental, and societal advantages. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.