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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 577 records · Page 32
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2025

Floating photovoltaic power plants: A review of energy yield, reliability, and operation and maintenance

Photovoltaic (PV) systems are essential for the transition to sustainable energy, reducing fossil fuel dependence and mitigating climate change. Although PV requires minimal land area — PV can meet the European Union's energy needs using only 0.26% of its land — space for deployment is often scarce in densely populated regions. Floating photovoltaics (FPV) offer an effective solution to land-use challenges by installing PV systems on floating structures in water bodies. FPV is a growing niche within PV with a cumulative installed capacity reaching 7.7 GW globally by 2023. Almost 90% of the installed FPV capacity is in Asia, with close to 50% of in China alone, while the Netherlands and France are the largest markets outside Asia. FPV shows strong potential to support climate targets, but still faces challenges like regulatory barriers, cost competitiveness compared to ground-based PV (GPV), and uncertainties about environmental impacts and system reliability. FPV systems are currently installed mainly on sheltered inland waters, such as quarry lakes, irrigation ponds and reservoirs. FPV technical standards are still being developed. Guidelines have been published by the World Bank, DNV, and Solar Power Europe, and emerging national standards from South Korea, China, and Singapore address design, components, and safety. The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) is working on formal standards for floats, mooring systems, and electrical connectors. However, the published best practices lack quantitative guidance for yield modelling and reliability, which this report aims to address. It provides data-driven insights, models, and parameters essential for accurate energy yield, reliability, and maintenance predictions over FPV systems' lifetimes.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Queued Up: 2024 Edition, Characteristics of Power Plants Seeking Transmission Interconnection As of the End of 2023 [Slides]

Electric transmission system operators (ISOs, RTOs, or utilities) require projects seeking to connect to the grid to undergo a series of impact studies before they can be built. This process establishes what new transmission equipment or upgrades may be needed before a project can connect to the system and assigns the costs of that equipment. The lists of projects in this process are known as “interconnection queues”. The amount of new electric capacity in these queues is growing dramatically, with nearly 2,600 gigawatts (GW) of total generation and storage capacity now seeking connection to the grid (over 95% of which is for zero-carbon resources like solar, wind, and battery storage). However, most projects that apply for interconnection are ultimately withdrawn, and those that are built are taking longer on average to complete the required studies and become operational. Data from these queues nonetheless provide a general indicator for mid-term trends in developer interest.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2020

Atmospheric Modeling to Enable Prediction of Golden Eagle Interactions with Wind Power Plants

This panel will explore the use of technologies and methods that enhance our understanding of eagle behavior in and near wind energy facilities. The decreasing costs of tracking technologies and substantial computational capabilities are allowing for finer resolution and confidence of eagle observations and the modeling of such datasets increase our understanding of their movements and use of airspace and underlying landscapes. Behavior ecologists' intrinsic knowledge of eagle behavior can augment and further enhance inferences from technology-derived information alone, e.g., GPS, camera, radar, etc. The panel will discuss the state of science and, given the cost-effective tools available, what research objectives are emerging to better assess and reduce wind-eagle risk. The discussion will focus on the following areas: Integrating Behavioral and Quantitative Ecologist perspectives of bald eagle and golden eagle behavior and wind energy risk; Regional-scale vs. facility-scale investigations of bald eagle and golden eagle use of airspace. For example, avoidance behavior to assess risk at facility-scale, and eagle use of landscapes, e.g., territories, nesting, and life-cycle behavior; Bald eagle and golden eagle use of airspace and nexus with atmospheric flow dynamics of wind energy generation; GPS, biomonitoring, tracking camera, radar, and other tools/techniques for deepening the knowledge of eagle behavior in and around wind farms.

49 EE - Wind and Water Power Program - Wind (EE-4W↗
DOE OSTI2023

Digital Twins for Nuclear Power Plants and Facilities

The nuclear digital twin (DT) is the virtual representation of a nuclear energy system across its lifecycle. The nuclear DT uses real-time information and other data sources to improve the process of design, licensing, construction, security, O&M, decommissioning, and waste disposal. By leveraging the knowledge base and experience from the past 40 years of LWR operation, the nuclear DT is helping to accelerate the development and deployment of advanced nuclear technology in areas of passive safety, new fuel forms, instrumentation, and reactor control. For the currently operating nuclear fleet, DTs are reducing the operational risks, increasing plant availability, increasing energy capability, and reducing electricity production costs. For advanced fission and fusion reactors, DTs are being used to design for passive safety and built-in security-by-design. Rapidly deployable small modular reactor (SMR) and microreactor designs compatible with modular construction techniques and advanced manufacturing will be the new normal, reducing the need for large capital expenditures and compressing construction schedules. In addition, lower operational and maintenance costs will be realized by reducing the complexity of operations, staffing needs, and maintenance-related activities.

Kropaczek, Dave↗
DOE OSTI2021

Pressurizer dynamic model and emulated programmable logic controllers for nuclear power plants cybersecurity investigations

This work demonstrates the functionality of the pressurizer using a fast-running three regions, non-equilibrium model and control programs of emulated PLCs. The state variables from an integrated model of primary loop in a representative PWR plant are communicated to the pressurizer’s emulated PLCs using a synchronized data transfer function. In turn, the PLCs communicate back instructions to the pressurizer model to adjust the pressure and water level to remain within preprogramed setpoints. Pressurizer model simultaneously solves the coupled mass and energy conservation equations in the saturated vapor and saturated and subcooled liquid regions using fixed step solver. Results demonstrate the response of the pressurizer model linked to an emulated pressure and water level PLCs in a simulated transient involving surge-in and surge-out events. The 50 ms response delay time for the emulated PLC insignificantly affects operation and predictions of the pressurizer model.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2020

A Model for Evaluating the Configuration and Dispatch of PV Plus Battery Power Plants

An open-source model was developed to optimize energy storage operation for photovoltaic- (PV-) plus-battery systems with AC-coupled and DC-coupled configurations. It includes the ability to use forecast energy prices to optimize battery charge and discharge on a rolling time horizon. The model allows for exploration of different configurations, including capital costs, inverter performance, dispatch flexibility, and capturing otherwise clipped energy for the DC-coupled system. The model can run 20 full years of hourly data in approximately two seconds, allowing comparison of a large number of configurations. We applied the model in a test case demonstrating reduced inverter clipping for DC-coupled systems and yielded slightly higher overall value than AC-coupled systems, with an approximately 2 percent increase in internal rate of return or benefit/cost ratio. Our results show that at current estimated prices for lithium-ion battery systems, large-scale PV-plus-battery plants are economically viable under the right conditions, with the configuration playing a role in system flexibility and performance. This model provides the ability for project developers, industry professionals, and researchers to use readily available software to quickly evaluate and design these systems.

41 EE - Solar Energy Technologies Office (EE-4S)↗