Thanks to a consortium of researchers, utilities, and system operators, freshly created simulations of how a new energy technology could function are hitting the scene, allowing power system engineers to start integrating more affordable, less polluting energy tech into the grid, CleanTechnica reports.
Traditional energy sources like coal, gas, hydroelectric dams, and nuclear plants all produce an alternating current, the CleanTechnica post explains. This is the type of electrical current that reverses direction at regular intervals.
But many modern, less polluting energy sources like solar and wind turbines, as well as the batteries that support them, produce direct current, meaning the electricity flows in one direction.
To merge a direct current with an alternating current and integrate clean energy into the grid, providers use inverters. There are two types of inverters: grid-following and grid-forming.
In the past, all inverters were grid-following. They controlled the current of the electricity, per the CleanTechnica post. However, as more and more polluting power sources like coal plants are being taken offline, and as more affordable and clean energy comes online, power system engineers are turning increasingly to grid-forming inverters that provide a necessary control to the voltage of the electricity they're handling.
"Grid-forming inverters are an enabling technology," said Kevin Schneider, a chief engineer and laboratory fellow at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), per CleanTechnica.
However, before plugging this new technology into the grid, engineers need models (simulations) of how these systems will work with the grid so the proposed system can be tested to see how it handles the new technology.
That's why the Universal Interoperability for Grid-Forming Inverters Consortium, also called UNIFI, has focused some of its efforts on grid-forming inverter modeling. Under UNIFI, PNNL researchers developed models for a wide range of uses.
"As more people electrify their homes and cars, the load on the grid changes," Schneider said. "The new models help us plan a grid that can handle those changes as more wind and solar come online as well."
That's great news as the U.S. races to convert to a clean-energy-powered grid by 2035.
The new models are already in use by the Western Electricity Coordinating Council, which manages America's western power grid, and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. Per the news post, early results are promising, as the models show that grid-forming inverters make the grid more resilient in times of stress or rural areas.
"The development of the grid-forming inverter models represents a significant leap forward in our ability to ensure grid stability and reliability," said Song Wang, a senior principal engineer at Portland General Electric and chair of the WECC Modeling and Validation Subcommittee.
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