NREL study looks at challenges, opportunities with grid modernization

The National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) has published a study the probes the challenges and opportunities with grid modernization.

The study, called Research Priorities and Opportunities in United States Competitive Wholesale Electricity Markets, seeks to provide foundational technical assistance to the seven U.S. independent system operators (ISOs) and regional transmission organizations (RTOs). These organizations regulate around 70 percent of electric sales in the United States.

“ISOs and RTOs are under pressure to maintain reliable, resilient, and affordable power as the grid transforms toward more distributed energy resources, customer participation, and changing market models,” Yinong Sun, NREL researcher and the lead author of the study, said. “With this first report, we lay out a broad research agenda for future market designs that are high priority to the U.S. ISOs/RTOs over the next 2–10 years.”

The collaborative effort comprises researchers from Argonne National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Electric Power Research Institute, and Johns Hopkins University. As a first step, the team worked with the ISOs/RTOs to prioritize relevant topic areas. The highest priority topics were reliability services and operational flexibility, followed by new and emerging technologies. For each topic area, the report discusses current market practices, relevant ISO/RTO market design initiatives, and major research opportunities in wholesale market design.

For the first application of the study, the team is executing three parallel technical tasks to address ISO/RTO-identified challenges related to 1) flexibility and operational reliability, 2) resource adequacy, and 3) market mechanisms to support resource investments.

“The national laboratories have specialized software and capabilities to understand grid modernization at a large scale,” Sun said. “By the end of the project, these capabilities will help to inform ISOs and RTOs on how to address upcoming market-oriented challenges.”