GE Research gets DOE grant to develop technologies to rapidly restore grid after weather events
The U.S. Department of Energy tapped GE Research for a project to develop grid resilient technologies that allow communities to rapidly restore power following hurricanes and severe weather events.
Specifically, GE Research will work with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory; LUMA Energy, which operates and manages the electrical grid in Puerto Rico; Sandia National Laboratories; and GE’s Renewable Energy and Digital businesses to develop and demonstrate an automated power restoration system in Puerto Rico that would enable a community to rapidly restore electricity after extreme weather events. GE Research was awarded $4.5 million for the project, with $3 million from the DOE and $1.5 million from an industry cost-share.
“Following Hurricane Fiona in mid-September, it took several weeks before many communities in Puerto Rico had their power fully restored. We’re aiming to develop and demonstrate an automated power system in Puerto Rico that would cut the restoration time from weeks and even months to just hours or days,” Dr. Bilgehan Donmez, a senior engineer in Electric Power Systems at GE Research and project leader, said.
GE’s automated rapid power restoration system will use sensors to collect outage data directly after a weather event occurs. Then, the grid software will process this data to assess power outage impacts in a given community and determine the best way to restore power. GE’s system will then automate this response by dispatching DER management systems that tap into the solar and battery backup power system to initiate a black start. This will deliver electricity independently to communities until the larger grid network can be restored.
A key focus of the project, said Donmez, will be to demonstrate an automated restoration system that could help underserved communities quickly restore power.
“All too often, it’s the underserved communities that are the last to see electricity restored to their homes and businesses following a severe event. Our hope is that being able to automate the process for restoring power in these communities faster, we will have a system that could serve all communities. Our demonstration project in Puerto Rico will serve as an instrumental proving ground to develop, test, and validate our system,” Donmez said.
