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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 1,099 records · Page 61
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2019

(DG)2 (Distributed Generation for Distribution Grids) [SWR-18-63]

(DG)2 is an impact analysis tool for electrical utilities to perform spatio-temporal analysis with solar and battery energy storage systems. The purpose of the tool is to help distribution utilities with identifying impacts and costs associated with locating a MW-scale solar farm and energy storage system at a certain location over other choices. This tool also assists utilities to assess the amount of reverse power flow at the transmission lines.

Latif, Aadil↗
DOE OSTI2021

dsgrid (Demand-Side Grid Toolkit) [SWR-21-52]

The demand-side grid model harnesses decades of sector-specific energy modeling expertise to understand current and future U.S. electricity load for power systems analyses. The API provides tools for submitting datasets to dsgrid projects, validating individual datasets and project data as a whole, querying, analysis, and visualization.

Hale, Elaine↗
DOE OSTI2022

Communication Requirements for Price-Based Grid Coordination

Meeting ambitious goals for carbon reduction and supporting an electric grid with high levels of renewable energy supply will require significant flexibility from the demand side. This paper outlines a system architecture and communication technology infrastructure to enable dynamic pricing to be used to finely tune coordination between the grid and its customers. Taking a cue from the success of Internet architecture, this system — Price-Based Grid Coordination — emphasizes simplicity and universality. It enables a wide variety of ways for prices and other signals to pass from the grid to individual flexible loads, including multiple possible locations for the intelligence that combines price signals with device functional needs. The paper includes a reference data model to describe how information from the utility level can be conveyed to customer devices, but independent of any particular protocol. The paper also summarizes technology standards development needs, and reviews research needs to address the full spectrum of coordination scenarios.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2021

Charting a Path for Research and Development of Reliability and Resilience in South Asia's Power Sector

The power sector in South Asia faces several trends with the potential to impact its reliability and resilience. Rapidly increasing demand, coupled with an increasing reliance on variable renewable resources and the circular linkages with climate change points to an increasing need to understand the extent of climate impacts on both the electricity load and the electricity generation. These larger shifts are also coupled with opportunities near the grid edge that could have a large impact on system planning and operations, such as electrification of the transport sector, increased reliance on buildings to serve a broader set of loads and be flexible resources for utilities, more efficient use of industrial and agricultural loads, and growth in distributed energy resources such as rooftop solar and batteries. It is critical that as this transformation takes place that expectations for reliability and resilience of the grid continue to increase in the region. The South Asia Group for Energy (SAGE), composed of USAID, the US Department of Energy, and three national laboratories, has been tasked with providing an overview of the research and development resources necessary to understand the upcoming challenges for the power system as it pertains to reliability and resilience. This discussion paper identifies some of the key trends and connections that are important for power sector reliability and resilience and provides a starting point for eliciting feedback from power sector stakeholders about their experiences and needs.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2022

A Robust Event Diagnostics Platform: Integrating Tensor Analytics and Machine Learning into Real-time Grid Monitoring

The objective of this project is to develop a robust event diagnostics (RED) platform by integrating state-of-the-art tensor analytics and machine learning into real-time grid monitoring. The proposed platform can effectively analyze and discover the information hiding within the provided PMU data for effective real-time grid monitoring. The proposed RED platform provides a set of robust diagnostics tools for grid operation and management, including 1) data quality assessment, 2) data completion, 3) event detection, and 4) robust event classification. All the functionalities of the RED platform can help the operator to make informed decisions and respond in a timely manner. The developed RED platform will serve as an innovative advisory tool to reliably identify key events and discover new insights about the events and grid characteristics in the PMU data, and contribute to the efficient, safe, reliable operation and design of the nation’s electric system.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2022

Large-scale Hydrogen Storage – Risk Assessment Seattle City Light and Port of Seattle [Abstract]

This CRADA presents the strategy that Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) will take to support Seattle City Light (SCL), and the Port of Seattle (Port) in performing a risk assessment of large-scale hydrogen storage. Risk assessment is often used to ensure that adequate measures are taken to protect workers and the public, the environment, infrastructure, and assets. A detailed risk assessment can also be used to direct funding and upgrades, to specific components and sub-systems in order to mitigate risks to the larger system. In this way risk assessments are often employed as a part of a larger risk management strategy, with the goal of minimizing the occurrence of hazards and to identify means to limit their consequences. Risk assessment is often used to engage and inform regulators, and to communicate how specific regulations are being met. However, it is important to note that the proposed work is not intended for SCL and the Port to use in order to gain regulatory acceptance for their proposed activities. The work performed as a part of this effort will be a preliminary risk assessment for early-stage component and system designs and should be considered research and development (R&D). As such, the proposed work will be performed to a quality level and design maturity consistent with R&D and is not considered appropriate for final safety analysis and regulatory compliance purposes. Previous and on-going work at SCL and the Port demonstrated the utility of deploying hydrogen systems at the Port. The deployment of hydrogen at the Port is a part of a larger vision of using hydrogen to address a range of issues for SCL and the Port. These include large-scale fueling of MD/HD vehicles, cargo-handling equipment (CHE), and harbor vessels to reduce emissions; support of adjacent LD vehicles; support of critical port operations during extreme events (i.e., resiliency); deferral of more capital- and time-intensive electrical distribution system upgrades while still supporting evolving port operations and decarbonization efforts; facilitating electrification by establishing energy storage as a grid resource, starting at strategic port locations; creation of a flexible market resource that can be used by SCL to generate revenue via arbitrage; support of planned future maritime operations that involve heavy use of hydrogen for ocean-going vessels; and future end-use applications involving natural gas pipeline hydrogen injection. Ultimately, the success of these activities is underpinned by the deployed storage capacity. Large-scale deployment of hydrogen systems will require hydrogen storage at a scale that has not been demonstrated. In addition, the ideal location for such multi-use systems is near the end user which will often necessitate deploying into urban and/or industrial areas. A detailed risk assessment using the Port as a test case is necessary to ensure the deployment of large-scale hydrogen is successful. Many technologies have been proposed for hydrogen storage; however, these technologies need to be analyzed as they apply to an actual site. The physical infrastructure and hydrogen use cases for the Port will be analyzed, and a risk assessment for compressed hydrogen, liquified hydrogen, and Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carrier (LOHC) storage will be performed. These risk assessments will be useful for understanding how each of these technologies would perform in terms of facility and public safety. The operating states of the proposed hydrogen systems at the Port will be analyzed and incorporated into the storage risk assessment. Scalability will also be analyzed to understand how future port uses would affect the overall risk assessment. Finally, using the risk assessment as a tool to inform engagement and to gain stakeholder acceptance will be explored.

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2024

Preliminary Process and Instrumentation Design of Advanced Reactor Integration with Refineries and Hydrogen Production Facilities

With the ongoing push to decarbonize energy use and especially greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors, there are incentives to investigate how nuclear reactors may be used to generate clean energy and be used in various energy economies beyond just the electrical grid. Two initial integrations, high temperature steam electrolysis (HTSE) and oil refineries, are investigated in this first DOE Integrated Energy Systems (IES) program detailed industrial integration design report. Increasingly detailed reports are anticipated both for the industries discussed in this report and for additional industries in the future of the program. This report is a robust starting point showing how integration thermodynamic analysis establishes the requirements on the reactor and methods by which those requirements can be evaluated for specific reactor designs. Two Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program awardees are selected as representative designs for their respective technologies: NuScale for light-water reactors (LWRs) and X-Energy for high temperature gas reactors (HTGRs). Other reactor technologies or specific reactor configurations would require specific analysis similar to what is done in this report, thus this report can be a reference point by which to extend this work to other nuclear plant designs.

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Solid State Transformer Architecture and Control Compensation for Common Mode Currents

A high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) or similar geomagnetic disturbance (GMD) has the potential to impact the operation of large-scale electric power grids. By introducing low-frequency common-mode (CM) currents, these events can degrade the performance of critical system components, such as large power transformers by introducing CM currents which can lead to magnetic saturation of the transformer core. In this work, a solid-state transformer (SST) is developed to replace susceptible equipment and improve grid resiliency by safely absorbing these CM disturbances. This device will be referred to as a common-mode solid-state transformer (CM-SST). An SST architecture based on a four-legged AC/DC converter is developed. This architecture enables active control of CM signals without disturbing the AC voltages or the real and reactive power delivery capabilities. A system-level model of this architecture is created, and time-domain simulations are performed to evaluate the SST’s performance in response to simulated CM disturbances. A control strategy for mitigating CM current is also investigated. Hamiltonian surface shaping and power flow control (HSSPFC) is used to design a nonlinear controller for the SST’s output inverter. The objectives of the controller are to suppress CM-induced AC current offsets and regulate AC currents to desired setpoints. Nonlinear system analysis is applied to design and validate the controller. Two cases are tested: (a) the proposed four-leg inverter and (b) a standard three-leg inverter. The results show that the proposed controller rapidly mitigates CM disturbances while maintaining high-quality AC current waveforms in the four-leg configuration. Finally, the hardware performance of an SST prototype is evaluated. In particular, the ability of the SST to safely redirect and absorb CM currents is demonstrated, showing how it can protect neighboring conventional transformers in the system. The study confirms that appropriate control laws allow the SST to protect both itself and adjacent transformers during a HEMP or GMD event.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
NASA NTRS1986

Brayton cycle solarized advanced gas turbine

Described is the development of a Brayton Engine/Generator Set for solar thermal to electrical power conversion, authorized under DOE/NASA Contract DEN3-181. The objective was to design, fabricate, assemble, and test a small, hybrid, 20-kW Brayton-engine-powered generator set. The latter, called a power conversion assembly (PCA), is designed to operate with solar energy obtained from a parobolic dish concentrator, 11 meters in diameter, or with fossil energy supplied by burning fuels in a combustor, or by a combination of both (hybrid model). The CPA consists of the Brayton cycle engine, a solar collector, a belt-driven 20-kW generator, and the necessary control systems for automatic operation in solar-only, fuel-only, and hybrid modes to supply electrical power to a utility grid. The original configuration of the generator set used the GTEC Model GTP36-51 gas turbine engine for the PCA prime mover. However, subsequent development of the GTEC Model AGT101 led to its selection as the powersource for the PCA. Performance characteristics of the latter, thermally coupled to a solar collector for operation in the solar mode, are presented. The PCA was successfully demonstrated in the fuel-only mode at the GTEC Phoenix, Arizona, facilities prior to its shipment to Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for installation and testing on a test bed concentractor (parabolic dish). Considerations relative to Brayton-engine development using the all-ceramic AGT101 when it becomes available, which would satisfy the DOE heat engine efficiency goal of 35 to 41 percent, are also discussed in the report.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS1991

Status of the advanced Stirling conversion system project for 25 kW dish Stirling applications

Technology development for Stirling convertors directed toward a dynamic power source for space applications is discussed. Space power requirements include high reliability with very long life, low vibration, and high system efficiency. The free-piston Stirling engine has the potential for future high power space conversion systems, either nuclear or solar powered. Although these applications appear to be quite different, their requirements complement each other. The advanced Stirling conversion system (ASCS) project at NASA Lewis Research Center is described. Each system design features a solar receiver/liquid metal heat transport system and a free-piston Stirling convertor with a means to provide nominally 25 kW of electric power to utility grid while meeting the US Department of Energy (DOE) performance and long term cost goals. The design is compared with other ASCS designs.

Shaltens, Richard K.↗
NASA NTRS2004

An Overview of Electric Propulsion Activities at NASA

This paper provides an overview of NASA s activities in the area of electric propulsion with an emphasis on project directions, recent progress, and a view of future project directions. The goals of the electric propulsion programs are to develop key technologies to enable new and ambitious science missions and to transfer these technologies to industry. Activities include the development of gridded ion thruster technology, Hall thruster technology, pulsed plasma thruster technology, and very high power electric propulsion technology, as well as systems technology that supports practical implementation of these advanced concepts. The performance of clusters of ion and Hall thrusters is being revisited. Mission analyses, based on science requirements and preliminary mission specifications, guide the technology projects and introduce mission planners to new capabilities. Significant in-house activity, with strong industrial/academia participation via contracts and grants, is maintained to address these development efforts. NASA has initiated a program covering nuclear powered spacecraft that includes both reactor and radioisotope power sources. This has provided an impetus to investigate higher power and higher specific impulse thruster systems. NASA continues to work closely with both supplier and user communities to maximize the understanding and acceptance of new technology in a timely and cost-effective manner. NASA s electric propulsion efforts are closely coordinated with Department of Defense and other national programs to assure the most effective use of available resources. Several NASA Centers are actively involved in these electric propulsion activities, including, the Glenn Research Center, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Johnson Space Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center.

Dunning, John W., Jr.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Identification of Worst Impact Zones for Power Grids During Extreme Weather Events Using Q-Learning

Both the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events have been trending higher in recent years, leading to significant infrastructure damage in the electric grid. The impact of these extreme weather events is desired to be analyzed and quantified to help transmission and distribution system operators prepare for and prevent significant damage and subsequent loss of power. In this paper, we develop an approach that models the impact of extreme weather on the grid and identifies the worst impact zone using Q-learning (a reinforcement learning approach). The identification results reveal grid vulnerability to weather events and provide insights for system operators to help achieve optimal resource allocation and crew dispatch to minimize the adverse impacts of extreme weather. Simulation studies are conducted on the IEEE 123-node system to demonstrate the performance of the proposed approach.

extreme weather↗
DOE OSTI2023

Enhancing the EVI-X National Framework to Address Emerging Questions on Charging Infrastructure Deployment

As large national investments in EV charging continue to be made, this project seeks to improve the state-of-the-art in EV infrastructure analysis. New and improved quantitative analysis capabilities will position VTO to support EERE Leadership, assist the DOT/DOE Joint Office through timely analysis, and provide a strategy for the deployment of the national charging network. This project supports on-going development of NREL's EVI-X Suite of charging infrastructure analysis tools, including tools supporting large-scale network planning, local site design decisions, and comprehensive financial analysis. EVI-X development complements and leverages other VTO-funded efforts to ensure inputs to EVI-X and output produced by EVI-X are consistent with and well-integrated into the VTO portfolio (e.g., EV adoption scenarios from TEMPO, charging infrastructure design provided to EVs@Scale, etc.).

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLIC↗
DOE OSTI2020

High-Performance Integrated Window and Façade Solutions for California

The researchers developed a new generation of high-performance façade systems and supporting design and management tools to support industry in meeting California’s greenhouse gas reduction targets, reduce energy consumption, and enable an adaptable response to minimize real-time demands on the electricity grid. The project resulted in five outcomes: (1) The research team developed an R-5, 1-inch thick, triplepane, insulating glass unit with a novel low-conductance aluminum frame. This technology can help significantly reduce residential cooling and heating loads, particularly during the evening. (2) The team developed a prototype of a windowintegrated local ventilation and energy recovery device that provides clean, dry fresh air through the façade with minimal energy requirements. (3) A daylight-redirecting louver system was prototyped to redirect sunlight 15–40 feet from the window. Simulations estimated that lighting energy use could be reduced by 35–54 percent without glare. (4) A control system incorporating physics-based equations and a mathematical solver was prototyped and field tested to demonstrate feasibility. Simulations estimated that total electricity costs could be reduced by 9-28 percent on sunny summer days through adaptive control of operable shading and daylighting components and the thermostat compared to state-of-the-art automatic façade controls in commercial building perimeter zones. (5) Supporting models and tools needed by industry for technology R&D and market transformation activities were validated. Attaining California’s clean energy goals require making a fundamental shift from today’s ad-hoc assemblages of static components to turnkey, intelligent, responsive, integrated building façade systems. These systems offered significant reductions in energy use, peak demand, and operating cost in California.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2020

Task 12 PV Sustainability - Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of Residential PV and Battery Storage Systems

Using a life cycle assessment (LCA), the environmental impacts from generating 1 kWh of electricity for self-consumption via a photovoltaic-battery system are determined. The system includes a 10 kWp multicrystalline-silicon photovoltaic (PV) system (solar irradiation about 1350 kWh/m2/year and annual yield 1000 kWh/kWp), an iron phosphate lithium-ion (LiFePO4) battery, and other components such as the control system, battery housing, and two inverters (one for the PV system and one for the battery system). Three options for the AC-coupled system with changing battery capacities (5, 10, or 20 kWh nominal capacity) are investigated. The environmental impacts are assessed using the indicators greenhouse gas emissions and cumulative energy demand (separated into total and non-renewable cumulative energy demand). In addition, the four most important impact categories for PV electricity - respiratory inorganics (particulate matter), acidification, energy carrier resource use, and minerals and metals resource use - are assessed according to the environmental footprint (EF) method. Data are drawn from the DETEC data DQRv2:2018, recent literature, and product details provided by manufacturers. The results show larger environmental impacts of PV-battery systems with increasing battery capacity; for capacities of 5, 10, and 20 kWh, the cumulative greenhouse gas emissions from 1 kWh of electricity generation for self-consumption via a PV-battery system are 80, 84, and 88 g CO 2- eq/kWh, respectively. The cumulative greenhouse gas emissions of PV electricity consumed directly or fed into the grid are 54 g CO 2 -eq/kWh. The corresponding total cumulative energy demands are 5.27, 5.40, and 5.50 MJ oil-eq/kWh, with non-renewable energy carriers contributing 1.16, 1.22, and 1.29 MJ oil-eq/kWh. In the investigated EF impact categories, we similarly observe a larger environmental burden with increasing battery capacity, except in the use of minerals and metals. Our sensitivity analyses show that using a nickel cobalt manganese oxide (NCM) lithium-ion battery, instead of an LiFePO 4 battery, leads to a comparable environmental impact in terms of greenhouse gas emissions and cumulative energy demand. However, the NCM battery increases the impact in the EF categories of acidification and respiratory inorganics by 7 and 10%, respectively, whereas energy carrier resource use decreases by 4% and minerals and metals resource use decrease by 1%. Using a copper indium selenium (CIS) PV panel instead of a multicrystalline-silicon decreases greenhouse gas emissions by 24%, non-renewable cumulative energy demand by 13%, and particulate matter emissions by 60% (the largest decrease). Furthermore, the calculated environmental impacts are sensitive to the assumed battery lifetime. A decrease from 5000 to 3000 charge cycles increases non-renewable cumulative energy demand by 24% and greenhouse gas emissions by 16%. Increasing from 5000 to 7000 charge cycles decreases the environmental impacts by 6% and 7% in terms of non-renewable cumulative energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions, respectively. A utility-scale battery system case study shows that using batteries to store PV electricity overproduction reduces greenhouse gas emissions compared to using natural gas backup electricity generation.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Minimizing grid energy consumption in wastewater treatment plants: Towards green energy solutions, water sustainability, and cleaner environment

Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) consume significant amount of energy to sustain their operation. From this point, the current study aims to enhance the capacity of these facilities to meet their energy needs by integrating renewable energy sources. The study focused on the investigation of two primary solar energy systems in As Samra WWTP in Jordan. The first system combines parabolic trough collectors (PTCs) with thermal energy storage (TES). This system primarily serves to fulfill the thermal energy demands of the plant by reducing the demands from boiler units, which allows more biogas for electricity generation. The second system is a photovoltaic (PV) system with Lithium-Ion batteries, which directly produces electricity that will be used to cover part of the electrical energy demands of plant. To assess the optimal configuration, two distinct scenarios have been formulated and compared to the current case scenario (SC#1). The first scenario focuses on maximizing the net present value (NPV) and minimizing the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE). The second scenario is centred on minimizing the levelized cost of heat (LCOH). The findings indicate that both scenarios succeeded in reducing the reliance on the grid to a value that reach 1 %. Moreover, they both reduced biogas percentage in energy production from 88 % to approximately 65 % through the integration of the PV system. In terms of thermal demand, SC#2 reduced the reliance on biogas boiler units from 100 % to 25 %, while SC#3 achieved an even more impressive reduction to just 8 %. The best LCOE value was attained in SC#2, at 0.0895 USD/kWh, with an NPV of 10.54 million USD. Conversely, SC# 3 yielded an LCOH value of 0.0432 USD/kWh th compared to 0.0534 USD/kWh th USD for SC#2. In conclusion, despite their relatively high capital and operating costs, SC#2 and SC#3 managed to substantially decrease the annual electricity expenditure from approximately 2 million USD to 86,000 USD and 0 USD, respectively.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2022

Transforming Energy Through Sustainable Mobility: Expanding Low-Carbon Transportation R&D Solutions

As the nation's premier laboratory for cutting-edge transportation decarbonization research and development solutions, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) pioneers the creation and deployment of sustainable mobility technologies and strategies, with a focus on slashing transportation sector greenhouse gas emissions and combatting climate change. Trucks, planes, cargo ships, and other difficult-to-decarbonize vehicles are part of this essential transition for the transportation sector, which is currently the nation's largest source of the greenhouse gas emissions. NREL provides the scientific building blocks needed to spur innovation through multifaceted analysis, research, and engineering. This work acts as a catalyst to help industry bring affordable, high-performance, energy-efficient, and low-emission modes of transport and related infrastructure to market sooner. Our researchers collaborate closely with academic, government, and industry partners to design better batteries, drivetrains, and engines. They develop technologies for high-power charging, thermal management, energy storage, and power electronics. They are also reimagining fuels and combustion while creating sustainable lightweight materials. Unbiased expert guidance - backed by credible data and analysis, tools, and scientific rigor - empowers partners to make informed decisions about sustainable transportation. NREL recognizes that communities with limited mobility options face reduced access to employment opportunities, health care, and education, lowering overall quality of life. Alongside partners, NREL experts are creating transportation solutions that meet community-identified needs and increase mobility equity in historically underserved and overburdened communities. Rather than providing a one-size-fits-all solution, we take an interdisciplinary approach to mobility equity that considers the needs and challenges of diverse groups, maximizing benefits at the individual, community, and societal levels.

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗