ECE 333

• Power and Energy Systems

Grading: The course grade is based on a team project assignment (5 %), quizzes (15 %), two midterm exams (20 % each) and the final exam (40 %). Each team of students will prepare a project report and present the results to the class.

• Review of concepts in electric circuit analysis
• Complex power concepts
• The interconnected power grid
• The basic nature and issues in energy supply and demand
• The US electricity industry – past and present
• Nature/role of renewable generation resources
• Wind as an energy resource
• Wind technologies
• Engineering economic analysis
• Sun as an energy resource
• Photovoltaic cell technologies
• Engineering aspects of renewable resource generation technologies
• Demand issues in energy
• Energy storage resources
• The role of markets in electricity
• Environmental aspects of renewable resource generation technologies
• Electricity policy and regulatory dimensions

• Review of concepts in electric circuit analysis
• Complex power concepts
• The interconnected power grid
• The basic nature and issues in energy supply and demand
• The US electricity industry – past and present
• Nature/role of renewable generation resources
• Wind as an energy resource
• Wind technologies
• Engineering economic analysis
• Sun as an energy resource
• Photovoltaic cell technologies
• Engineering aspects of renewable resource generation technologies
• Demand issues in energy
• Energy storage resources
• The role of markets in electricity
• Environmental aspects of renewable resource generation technologies
• Electricity policy and regulatory dimensions

Grading: The course grade is based on a team project assignment (5 %), quizzes (15 %), two midterm exams (20 % each) and the final exam (40 %). Each team of students will prepare a project report and present the results to the class.

Gilbert M. Masters, Renewable and Efficient Electric Power Systems, second edition, IEEE Press - Wiley, 2013. ISBN 978-1-118-14062-8

The list of references is updated yearly and is provided to the reference section of Grainger Library and Information Center to make the publications available to the students.

The course focus is on the technical, economic and environmental aspects of renewable energy systems with the aim to obtain an understanding of their role in meeting society’s electricity needs in sustainable ways. The main course goals are to provide students with an overview of renewable electric energy systems, acquaint students with key basic physical principles used in renewable energy generation, expose students to the technical and engineering challenges in the implementation of renewable energy projects, stress the environmental and societal benefits from the deployment of renewable resources and understand the criticality of economics − including the role of incentives and the harnessing of market forces – and policy formulation to bring about deeper penetrations of renewable resources.

A. By the time of Exam No. 1 (after approximately 11 ninety-minute lectures), the students will have the background and knowledge to:

1. provide a basic overview of the global and national energy infrastructure, the electric power industry structure and the outcomes of its restructuring and the requisite knowledge of the nature of the demand and the key sources of energy supply (2), (4), (7)

2. understand the role of the fossil fuel resources to meet the demand and the growing importance of renewable resources’ contributions to the attainment of supply-demand balance (2), (4), (7)

3. become proficient with electric circuit analysis in the sinusoidal steady state and understand the concepts of power factor angle, power factor, complex power and conservation of power (1)

4. gain insights into the Energy Conservation Principle – the unalterable invariance characteristic of energy – and its application in energy conversion (1), (2), (6)

5. understand the scientific principles underlying wind as an energy source, the physics of rotors, the evaluation of power in the wind, the analysis of specific power and its temperature and altitude sensitivities and tower height impacts of on wind turbine output (1), (2), (4)

6. gain insights into limits on conversion of wind into electricity, understand the types of wind turbine generators and know wind farm configuration and environmental effects (2), (4), (6)

7. become familiar with wind data analysis concepts, the importance of the idealized wind turbine power curve, the evaluation of the impacts of key design parameters and wind turbine components and the elements of a nacelle (2), (6), (4)

8. understand the basis of a probabilistic model for wind speed uncertainty and the use of parametric and non-parametric wind speed distributions to use both actual wind speed measurements or assumed wind speed probability distribution functions to determine the average energy available from a wind site (1), (6)

B. By the time of Exam No. 2 (after approximately 22 lectures), the students will have the background and knowledge to perform all the items listed under A, plus the following:

9. understand the basic concepts of energy economics analysis: time value of money, cash flows, internal rate of return, inflation impacts and calculations (1), (6)

10. understand the basic concepts in power system economics: load representation, conventional generation unit economics, heat rate, capacity factor and the elements of fixed costs and variable costs (1), (4), (6)

11. assimilate the concept of levelized cost of energy for a wind resource and understand the role of production tax credits (4), (6)

12. understand the scientific principles underlying solar energy resource as the most abundant renewable energy source: extraterrestrial solar irradiation, solar position in the sky, latitude and longitude, earth’s rotation, solar position in the sky, solar declination angle, solar hour angle, solar azimuth angle and solar and civil time (1), (6)

13. become familiar with solar insolation components – direct beam, diffused and reflected radiation – and their measurement, approximation of the clear–sky direct beam radiation, solar panel position/orientation impacts on the insolation received by the solar panels and tracking systems (1), (6)

14. understand the basic concepts of a photovoltaic (PV) cell and its current–voltage curve, the path from the PV cell to a module and an array, maximum power point tracking (MPPT), prinicpal elements of a grid –connected PV system and the sizing and design of PV system configurations for specific objectives (1), (4), (6)

15. gain the skills to approximate the power and the energy delivered by a grid–connected PV system, analysis of PV arrays equipped with MPPT control and the evaluation of its performance with reference to that of a trackingless system and effective deployment of US solar data bases (1), (2), (4), (6)

16. understand the application of economic analysis to PV systems, assimilate the concept of levelized cost of energy for a solar resource, understand the role of investment tax credits, gain insights into system installation costs and apply the economic analysis to the specification and analysis of solar power purchase agreements (2), (4), (6)

17. understand the key drivers of the PV system growth, land requirements, the status of PV technologies, the issues in net metering and the PV technology benefits (2), (4), (6)

18. be able to describe concentrated solar power (CSP) plant categories and understand the operation of CSP plants with thermal storage devices, their economics, technology maturity and operational performance and perform comparative analysis of PV and CSP (1), (2), (4), (6)

C. By the time of the Final Exam (after approximately 30 lectures), the students have the background and knowledge to perform all the items listed under A and B, plus the following:

19. understand the nature of demand–side issues in energy, role of energy efficiency, the impacts of demand–side management (DSM), the role of price–sensitive demand response and the application of advanced metering infrastructure (AMI); acquire the skills to evaluate savings in DSM and the cost effectiveness of DSM programs to perform thei benefits cost analysis (1), (4), (6)

20. become familiar with the energy storage resources (ESR) technologies, their economics and comparative merits, understand the critical importance of energy storage and applications to power systems, the multiple roles ESRs can play, the policy initiatives and the ESR market developments (1), (2), (4), (6)

21. prepare a team-written paper on a green electric energy technology in a societal context. (2), (3), (4), (6)

22. understand the professional and ethical responsibilities associated with green electric energy systems. (4)