Projects
P16.
Funder: US Department of Energy, Maryland Energy Administration, and Massachusetts Clean Energy Center | 2024-2029 | Role: JHU Co-Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $11,700,000
Title: Academic Center for Reliability and Resilience of Offshore Wind (ARROW)
Abstract: ARROW comprises of eight universities, three national laboratories, two state-level energy offices, and many industry and stakeholder groups. It is designed to foster and support a diverse, enduring offshore workforce that is domestically educated while ensuring reliable, resilient, equitable, low-cost, and rapid deployment of offshore wind energy.
According to the DOE, ARROW aligns with the Biden-Harris administration’s clean energy targets: Deploying 30 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2030, transitioning to a 100% clean electricity grid by 2035, and achieving net zero emissions economy-wide by 2050.
P15.
Funder: US Department of Energy | Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy | 2023-2026 | Role: Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $1,875,000
Title: Western-Based Analysis of Distributed Battery Storage System Emission Benefits and Tradeoffs
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Abstract: The Buildings Energy Efficiency Frontiers and Innovation Technologies (BENEFIT) funding opportunity will help advance cost-effective solutions to successfully electrify buildings across the nation while also improving their energy efficiency and demand flexibility. In this project, we will evaluate the dispatch and emissions impacts of thousands of battery energy storage systems in support of development of more efficient, equitable, and effective dispatch schedules.
P14.
Funder: US Department of Energy | Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy | 2023-2024 | Role: Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $120,000
Title: Market and Retail Rate Know-how for the Energy Transition (MARKET) Research
Abstract: The objective of this task is to develop and apply an analytical framework that can be used to assess how different incentive mechanisms to support resource adequacy in system operations, and compare the efficiency of these mechanisms operation against various capacity market structures.
P13.
Funder: Johns Hopkins University (Nexus Award) | 2023-2024 | Role: Co-Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $56,000
Title: How Can Energy Markets Best Enable and Assist the Transition to a Decarbonized Power Sector? Using 555 Pennsylvania to Magnify the Activities and Policy Influence of the JHU-Columbia Future Power Markets Forum
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Abstract: The 555 Pennsylvania Avenue facility, together with the post-COVID opportunities for in-person interactions among policymakers and stakeholders, present an extraordinary opportunity to amplify the impact of these ideas upon the future of the electric power industry, and to firmly plant Johns Hopkins, Columbia University, and the Future Power Markets Forum in the center of Washington energy policy discussions and debates.
P12.
Funder: Johns Hopkins University (Discovery Award) | 2023-2025 | Role: Co-Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $150,000
Title: Supply-chain-constrained Capacity Expansion for Decarbonized Power Grid
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Abstract: This project will bridge the gap between the (i) capacity expansion models “optimizing” expansion decisions in power grids, and (ii) emerging supply chain models used for sourcing raw materials, manufacturing intermediate components, and delivering the grid storage and renewable technologies.
P11.
Funder: Ralph O'Connor Sustainable Energy Institute | 2023-2025 | Role: Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $110,000
Title: A Global Solver for Exact AC Transmission Expansion Planning Problem
Abstract: This project is about extending the Global-TEP_a global solver for AC transmission expansion planning.
P10.
Funder: New Frontiers in Research Fund (Canada) | 2023-2025 | Role: Collaborator | Approved Budget: $250,000
Title: Global Optimal and Interpretable Models for Grid-scale Battery Management
Abstract: This project is about investigating a novel method for finding the globally optimal management of grid-scale batteries.
P9.
Funder: US Department of Energy | Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy | 2022-2025 | Role: Co-Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $240,000
Title: Grid Solutions for Wholesale Electricity Markets
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Abstract: This project will explore how competitive wholesale electricity markets can best support the transition to a decarbonized future.
P8.
Funder: Maryland Environmental Service | 2022-2023 | Role: Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $122,000
Title: A Transparent Tool for Stakeholder Evaluation of Electric Sector Transition Paths
Abstract: The goal of this project is to provide a production costing and resource/transmission expansion planning tool for evaluating portfolios of alternative investments in supply-side, storage, and demand-side resources for meeting scenarios of future electricity needs. This tool is intended to be transparent, easy to use, flexible, open-source, and widely accessible to stakeholders participating in planning and policy processes, while capturing essential technical and economic characteristics of renewable energy production, storage, and transmission.
P7.
Funder: Electric Power Research Institute | 2022-2023 | Role: Principal Investigator | Approved Budget: $37,000
Title: Impacts of Long-Duration Energy Storage Coordinated Expansion Planning_A Julia-based JHSMINE Study
Abstract: The scope of this work focuses on enhancing the Johns Hopkins Stochastic Multi-stage Integrated Network Expansion tool (JHSMINE) by transferring it from AIMMS to Julia, and by adding suitable models for long-duration energy storage. This will allow assessing the benefits of such enhancements in terms of improved plans. JHSMINE considers several significant aspects of the capacity expansion planning model such as unit commitment, linearized power flow, renewable energy policies, and energy trading credits, etc., and has been used in other projects such as WECC Land Use Projections, Sloan Foundation, 2019-2022; WECC Temporal Granularity and Decomposition, EPRI, 2019-2020; ERCOT Grid Modernization Laboratory Consortium Generation Transmission Downscaling, USDOE, 2020-2023; among many others.
P6.
Funder: US Department of Energy | National Offshore Wind Research & Development Consortium | 2022-2024 | Role: Investigator | Approved Budget: $135,000
Title: Ensuring Long-Term Availability and Bankability of Offshore Wind Through Hurricane Risk Assessment and Mitigation
Abstract: We expect this proposal to remove a significant amount of the uncertainty associated with conjectures about hurricane risk with a targeted, industry-driven series of investigations that span from basic atmospheric science to highly applied offshore wind engineering. The team plans to examine the project through the following lens:
Are the risks large enough that the grid should take special precautions to provide backup power in case of such an event? Or are the risks relatively small compared to the vulnerability of the present power system to outages due to freezing or heat waves that increases electricity demands while at the same time reducing the capability of traditional power plants?
P5.
Funder: US Department of Energy | Grid Modernization Laboratory Consortium | 2020-2023 | Role: Investigator
Title: Foundational Assistance to ISO/RTOs under Electricity Market Transformation
Abstract: ISOs and RTOs face numerous challenges in maintaining reliability, resiliency, and affordability in an evolving power system. A consortium of researchers that includes Argonne National Laboratory, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Electric Power Research Institute, and Johns Hopkins University has been collaborating on a project to provide technical assistance and research to guide the Independent System Operator (ISO) and Regional Transmission Organizations (RTO), and their stakeholders, on the evolution anticipated as supportive of future electricity markets. The team has been working closely with a set of advisors from the U.S. ISOs and RTOs to advise on the needed R&D to support a reliable and economically efficient electricity market of the future.
P4.
Funder: FNR CORE (Luxembourg) | 2019-2021 | Role: Investigator
Award Number: C18/SR/12676686
Title: Energy management system for smart sustainable buildings: planning, operation and optimal integration in the smart energy system (gENESiS)
Abstract: Striving to mitigate CO2 emissions in a cost-effective manner, the European Union (EU) has unprecedentedly emphasized, through its directive 2010/31/EU (revised in 2016), energy efficiency improvement in the building sector, responsible for 36% CO2 emissions in the EU. This directive supports renewable energy sources (RES) integration, imposing that, by the end of 2020, new buildings must be nearly zero-energy buildings (nZEBs), meaning that their on-site RES energy production and consumption be yearly nearly balanced. To achieve this goal, buildings are being equipped with RES and possibly energy storage devices. To ensure nZEB stakeholders compliance and investment profitability, it is vital to design an efficient energy management system (EMS) to optimally steer RES, storage, and deferrable loads (smart appliances, electric vehicles, heat pumps).
P3.
Funder: National Science Foundation | 2017-2021 | Role: Investigator
Award Number: 1711850
Title: A Global Algorithm for Quadratic Nonconvex AC-OPF Based on Successive Linear Optimization and Convex Relaxation
Abstract: Non-convex programming involves optimization problems where either the objective function or constraint set is a non-convex function. These kinds of problems arise in a broad range of applications in engineering systems. Despite the substantial literature on convex and non-convex quadratic programming (general classes of optimization problems), most available optimization techniques are either not scalable or work efficiently only for convex quadratic programming and do not provide adequate results for non-convex quadratic programming. This project focuses on fundamental research on an integrated approach which the research team expects will lead to powerful solution methods for classes of non-convex programming problems. The new approach will be applicable for non-convex problems arising in many areas, such as power and energy systems, transportation, and communications. The project will involve students from underrepresented groups and will positively impact engineering education.
P2.
Funder: National Science Foundation | 2016-2017 | Role: Investigator
Award Number: 1622877
Title: A Fast and Efficient Power System Dynamic Simulator
Abstract: This project will develop a software program for dynamic analysis of power grids. In electric power industries, grid simulators are vital tools to evaluate and analyze dynamic behavior of the grid. Power grids are large-scale networks that are mathematically modeled by thousands of variables and equations. Analysis of such a large number of variables and equations is very time-consuming. Integration of intermittent renewable energy resources as well as small-scale low-inertia generators to modern power grids make the network analysis even more challenging. In the proposed algorithm (to become a software program) a novel mathematical solver is proposed that significantly reduces the computations required to solve the well-known differential-algebraic equations describing power systems. The proposed algorithm contributes to the reduction of the size of the Jacobian matrix and removal of the error loop in the power grid dynamic simulations. These improvements significantly increase the speed of the proposed software program in analyzing dynamic behavior of power grids when compared to the available methods. Preliminary studies show that the proposed power grid simulator can perform at least 30 times faster than the standard Newton-Raphson algorithm when simulating large grids with significant number of generators.
P1.
Funder: Louisiana Board of Regents | 2016-2018 | Role: Investigator
Grant Number: LEQSF(2016-19)-RD-A-10
Title: A System of Systems Based Distributed Algorithm for Collaborative Power Transmission and Distribution Planning
Abstract: In smart electric power grids, the system’s physical structure is becoming more distributed, and different entities take the control responsibility of different parts of transmission and distribution systems. Although these entities might be independent, any decision made by a control entity affects decisions made by other entities as they are physically interconnected. The objective of the proposed research is to develop a system of systems engineering (SoSE) frameworks for collaborative power transmission and distribution planning in smart grids.