CCET facilitates electric industry, technology company and university collaboration for the purpose of enhancing the safety, reliability, security, and efficiency of the Texas electric transmission and distribution system through research, development and commercialization of emerging technologies.

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2010 CCET/IEEE Undergraduate Level Design Contest

2010 Student Contest Winners

The winners of the IEEE/CCET 2010 student design contest have been announced! In 2010, the undergraduate level topic involved designing a home energy management system for homes equipped with solar and battery storage and the graduate level topic was automatic phase detection. Each of the winning teams and/or individual was invited to attend an Awards Banquet hosted by IEEE Region 5 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Undergraduate Level Contest Winner

First-place went to the team led by Beny Vasquez of The University of Texas - Pan American, Edinburg, Texas. Team Members included Gabriel Benavides, Roberto Morales, Emile Kowalski.

Graduate Level Contest Winners

First-place went to the team led by Miguel Hinojosa of Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas. Team members included Rajnish Kumar.

Second-place went to Justin Gregory Adams of Lamar University, Beaumont, Texas.

Congratulations to all!

Design Topic

Optimizing Renewable Energy with Energy Storage by Designing a Home Energy Management System in Real Time Pricing Environment

Summary

For 2010, student contestants explored both the engineering design and the economic analysis and optimization of a combined renewable energy source and electrical energy storage system applied in a real time pricing power market. The objective is to demonstrate both engineering competence and a thorough understanding of the economics around such systems.

Design Plan

In 2010, the students were asked to prepare a paper design of a residential energy management system (REMS) to optimize energy flows in a home equipped with renewable generation (2kW) and energy storage in a real time pricing environment. The paper design had to include both an engineering design and economic analysis of a residential energy system that includes a renewable energy source (solar photovoltaic, wind, or other competitor's choice), an electrical energy storage device (battery, flywheel, super capacitor, other?), and a home energy management system to be designed by the contestants. The objective was to minimize the cost of energy in a real time pricing (RTP) market by developing algorithms for deciding when to charge or discharge the storage device, or sell power back to the grid.

A successful design emphasized user safety, leverage applicable industry standards, support a viable business case (renewable energy credits may be considered or even recommended), and perform a sensitivity study to optimize the system components. Because of the emphasis of economics in this project and the increasing importance for smart grid technology to demonstrate a solid "business case", EE students were encouraged to team with students from the school of business or economics on their campus. However, teams were not required to do so and, as in the past, judges did not know the composition of the teams.

Background

Real time pricing is one of the new service offerings made possible for customers with Smart Grid technologies. Instead of being billed for a set price per kWh over a monthly period, the customer agrees to pay a rate that varies during the day based on the actual cost of the energy being produced. For example, at times the customer may be paying 2 cents per kWh; at other times - when demand is high and expensive generation is being called up to meet the high load and increased congestion that may be occurring on the distribution grid - a customer may be paying 50 cents per kWh.

If the customer has the ability to generate power and store energy (e.g., a solar photovoltaic array and a battery), the customer can sell excess power back to the grid when prices are high, and charge his battery with grid power when prices are low. A device that would automatically determine how to use energy based on customer preferences (e.g., washing clothes and dishes during the middle of the night), or when to charge or discharge an energy storage system, could be beneficial in the future when this scenario becomes more common.

For customers with "smart appliances" and solar and battery storage, it would be advantageous to coordinate their higher energy consumption with times of abundant solar energy. Or alternatively, it may be worthwhile to delay their appliance use until early morning hours when prices may be low. While few homes are equipped with both solar and storage, and very few retail electric utilities offer real time pricing, the infrastructure to make this happen in the future is being deployed now.

In Texas alone, more than six million smart meters are being deployed.

The design sought for in this contest could be the key to making renewable generation, storage, and RTP a cost-effective reality with significant benefits to the environment, rate payers, and the economy.