Alternatives to Reduce Grid Disturbances Caused by the Rapid Increase in Distributed Energy Resources

This dissertation is composed of three main articles, which are detailed below. First article: The proliferation of prosumers generates the opportunity to have a more decentralized and open energy market. Given this opportunity, the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) trading energy paradigm appears, where consumers and prosumers can exchange energy without an intermediary. Because P2P energy trading plays a fundamental role in the proliferation of renewable energies and the system flexibility for a low-carbon energy transition, this article provides a review of the P2P energy trading that is necessary to understand the current approaches, challenges, and future research that should be conducted in this area. As a result, areas for consideration were identified and grouped into the following six topics: (1) trading platform, (2) blockchain, (3) game theory, (4) simulation, (5) optimization, and (6) algorithms. The study identified several challenges that may give way to future research, such as integrating generation, transmission, and distribution into studies, large-scale studies, and modeling consumer and prosumer complex behavior. Given that P2P energy trading is a relatively new topic, there is still much work to be done to implement the real-world model successfully. Second article: Along with the exponential growth of distributed energy sources in the last decade, net-metering programs have expanded to encourage investment in renewable energy. However, several countries and some states in the United States are ending these programs. Therefore, it is needed to explore alternatives to net-metering programs to continue encouraging the adoption of renewable energies. In this paper, Peer-to-Peer (P2P) models are studied as viable options to net-metering. In particular, the evaluation and comparison of the net-metering model to two P2P models is proposed. The first P2P model used the power grid for electricity exchange, and the other used electric vehicles. Simulations of a 50 household microgrid with access to electric vehicles and photovoltaic generation were run to achieve this objective. Technical and economic indexes were established to measure the performance of the three models. The results indicated that the P2P model using the grid shows the best performance, followed by the P2P model using electric vehicles. Third article: Solar generation has increased rapidly in recent years worldwide, and it is projected to continue to grow exponentially. A problem exists in that the increase in solar energy generation will increase the probability of grid disturbances. This article focused on analyzing the grid disturbances caused by the massive integration to the transmission line utility-scale solar loaded to the balancing authority high voltage transmission lines in four regions of the United States electrical system: (1) California, (2) Southwest, (3) New England, and (4) New York. Statistical analysis of equality of means was carried out to detect changes in the energy balance and peak power. Results show that when comparing the difference between hourly net generation and demand, energy imbalance occurs in the regions with the highest solar generation: California and Southwest. No significant difference was found in any of the four regions in relation to the energy peaks. The results imply that regions with greater utility level solar energy adoption must conduct greater energy exchanges with other regions to reduce potential disturbances to the grid. It is essential to bear in mind that as the installed solar generation capacity increases, the potential energy imbalances created in the grid increase