Analyzing controller conflicts in multimodal smart grids - framework design

• Published in: Energy Informatics 2018-10, Vol.1 (Suppl 1), p.319-325, Article 34
• Main Authors: Nieße, Astrid, Shahbakhsh, Arash
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adaptive systems; Communications systems; Computer networks; Computer Science; Controller conflicts; Controllers; Distributed generation; Electric power grids; Emergence; Energy sources; Information Systems and Communication Service; Infrastructure; Multi-agent systems; Multimodal energy systems; Smart grid; Smart grids
• ISSN: 2520-8942; 2520-8942
• DOI: 10.1186/s42162-018-0041-3

In future energy systems dominated by distributed energy resources, additional flexibility potential will be unlocked by interlinking the infrastructures of different energy systems. Direct and indirect coupling of different energy systems like power grids, gas and heat infrastructures leads to multimodal energy systems. Combined with an ongoing pervasion of the resulting interconnected system with information and communication technology (ICT), multimodal smart grids evolve. The pervasion of the system with autonomous controllers leads on to the development of a distributed adaptive system. From an engineering perspective, it shows the desired characteristics regarding scalability and self-stabilization. Unlike these desired aspects, other effects can emerge from the distributed and adaptive nature of this system: Autonomous controllers might counteract, thus leading to instable system states. From the perspective of distributed systems research, these controller conflicts can thus be understood as unintended effects of emergence. In this short paper, we present design decision for a framework that will be developed for the evaluation of controller conflicts in multimodal smart grids. The concept of technical emergence will be applied to deterministically simulate controller conflicts generated by autonomous controllers of interlinked infrastructures.