Research

Start date: 1 June 2021;      End date: 31 May 2025

The principal goal of the InnoCyPES ITN is to provide world-leading and transferable scientific training to a new generation of 15 high-achieving early stage researchers (ESRs). In the course of their training, they will study, investigate and improve various facets of digitalized and interconnected energy systems. Supervised by a consortium of prominent and experienced academic institutions, research institutes and industrial partners, they will collaboratively develop a cutting-edge system management platform that covers the entire lifecycle of data for energy system planning, operation and maintenance, based on an understanding of the energy system as a cyber-physical system.

The increasing volume, velocity, and variety of data from a massive number of dispersed “Internet of things” sensors in the energy system offers opportunities for improved operational efficiency and reliability – but it also results in threats in the form of computational burden and cyber-attacks. The transformation towards a fully digitalized energy system requires substantial improvements in coordinated design of cyber and physical systems, end-to-end data processing tools, and enabling changes in policy, incentive and regulatory mechanisms. Their absence acts as a barrier for the energy industry in translating the fast-accumulating data into actionable knowledge. The ESR projects will target key bottlenecks for this digital transformation. The tools that will be developed will be released as an open source platform for maximum impact.

In InnoCyPES, the ESRs will be enrolled in an intensive doctoral training program that is both intersectoral – involving key stakeholders – and interdisciplinary, including information science, energy systems engineering and social science. Moreover, each ESR has both academic and industrial advisors. It will thus provide ESRs with skills that are in high demand by industry and academia, preparing them for thriving careers in this burgeoning area.

New website: InnoCyPES – Innovative Tools for Cyber-Physical Energy Systems 

Start date: 1 January 2022;      End date: 30 June 2023

The present project will address this important topic, proposing a new methodology to quantify the interactions between Water, Energy and Food in IKs. Commonly known as the Water-Energy-Food Nexus (WEFN), the developed methodology will provide a holistic approach to assess the impact of IK activity on the consumption of electricity and water.

To achieve this vision, the project will start by understanding the perceptions of the stakeholders (IK managers and users) about the WEFN, through questionnaires and interviews to IK stakeholders in the city of Lisbon. During this process, two IK will be recruited to collaborate in this project. The main goal is to install a set of sensors and metering systems to measure the consumption both of energy and water. The sensors and meters, already acquired by the partner entities, will be installed for a year, allowing the measurement of global consumption as well as the consumption of the most important equipment and appliances existing in the IK. To deal with structured (from sensors), and unstructured data(from surveys and interviews) a common data model that integrates the different data sources will also be proposed.

Start date: 1 July 2021;      End date: 30 June 2023

The use of local energy storage systems associated with the generalization of distributed energy production systems is an irreversible trend in modern societies. Although the prices of these systems are not yet at a point that guarantees their competitiveness, it is expected that this scenario will change in the coming years. Thus, most of the utilities are considering this change, not only as a threat to their core business (energy sales), but also as a relevant opportunity for the development of new services that create benefits for the consumer. Final. It should also be noted that, at the national level, electricity prices in purchasing power parity are relatively high, so ways that allow achieving benefits for the final consumer, as the present project intends to achieve, are beneficial to society. 

Start date: 1 April 2021;      End date: 31 July 2022

Development of advanced models for disaggregation and synthesis of time series data distributed consumption and production; utilization of disaggregated time series to train new forecast models adapted to the dynamics typical of HV and MV consumption and production in order to significantly improve forecasts quality 72H ahead, make the codes of predictive models available as open-source apps and monitor their integration on the Azure platform.

Start date: 1 May 2022;      End date: 30 June 2022

Evaluate the impact of renewable and citizen energy communities in medium voltage distribution grids. The study should analyse the Evaluate the impact of Energy Storage Systems (ESS) based on Li-ion batteries in the operational planning tools used by distribution system operators. In the last two years, ESSs have been installed in medium voltage networks mainly in wind farms. The coordination between wind

production and ESS will change the generation profile of wind farms and consequently the anticipation of constraints in operational planning.

In this project, it is expected to evaluate the impact of these changes and propose some strategies to mitigate their impact on the operational planning accuracy. 

Start date: 1 September 2021;      End date: 31 December 2021

Evaluate the impact of renewable and citizen energy communities in medium voltage distribution grids. The study should analyse the impact in rural and urban areas considering the existence of other distributes energy resources already connected in the same network.

Energy communities should be managed by a specific energy management system with the ability to manage the generation and consumption existing in the energy community.

Start date: 1 June 2021;      End date: 30 September 2021

Analysis of the Portuguese transmission grid w.r.t. to the capacity available to receive new renewable production from photovoltaics.

Identification of the main capacity limitations that derive from the application of the planning criteria in force to the information disclosed by the operator on the characteristics of grid equipment, generation injections and interconnection flows, in typical peak and off-peak loading scenarios.