PNNL contributes electric power grid recommendations to National Academies report

The Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) recently released findings and recommendations to enhance the nation’s electric power grid and its resilience.

The research was included in a congressionally mandated report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS), which is also identifying non-technology barriers, such as regulatory, ownership, and financial issues, that stand in the way of new or expanding technology in the electric sector.

Prior to the release of information, a committee was formed to recommend strategies and priorities for a more reliable and resilient transmission and distribution system. Of the 17 NAS committee members that authored the report, Jeff Dagle, chief electrical engineer at PNNL, was the sole national laboratory representative.

“Reliability and resilience are closely related but while reliability focuses on service interruptions, resilience is more difficult to measure,” Dagle said. “Resiliency is reducing the magnitude and duration of impact to events, and measuring resilience means that you are measuring things that have not yet occurred. It speaks to preparedness.”

The committee has been examining information for the past 18 months, considering how various existing and emerging technological options could impact grid reliability and the ability to recover from grid disruptions.

“Resilient infrastructure is robust to all hazards, ranging from storms to malicious events,” Dagle said. “Even from threats that are not envisioned. That is what makes its design challenging and interesting.”