EAGER: Blackout: An educational experiment in gaming the power grid

随着电网围绕市场机制进行重组，并日益与环境相结合，电网正变得越来越复杂。这种不断上升的复杂性对工程教育界提出了挑战，目前工程教育界还没有合适的工具来教授如何处理大型基础设施的设计和管理。基于已证实的游戏提供的教育益处，研究人员建议通过开发停电来解决对一种新工具的需求，这是一种持久的、基于网页浏览器的、关于电力动态市场的多人在线游戏。本项目侧重于《Blackout》的概念开发，与一位经验丰富的游戏设计专业人士合作。这种设计过程强调的是规则和游戏体验，而不是美术、编程、营销、文件等游戏开发中成本更高的其他方面。研究人员和研究生将积极参与这一迭代设计过程的各个阶段，并利用他们各自在分布式控制系统和定价以及电力系统动力学和控制方面的专业知识，指定目标并确保游戏规则和环境，同时简化，保留主要的基本特征和挑战作为真实的电力系统。在概念开发的最后阶段，研究人员希望能够创造出一款能够通过远程Web浏览器进行体验的多人游戏原型。如果取得成功，像《Blackout》这样的游戏将在提高公众对基础设施设计和监管的挑战和重要性的认识，以及培养下一代工程师和科学家方面发挥重要作用。最终的原型游戏将在网上提供给公众和研究社区。该项目将为本科生和研究生提供参与的机会，并将产生一种教学工具，可能有助于吸引非传统工程专业的学生。

Power grids are getting dramatically more complex, as they reorganize around market mechanisms and become increasingly coupled with the environment. This rising level of complexity poses a challenge to the engineering education community, which currently does not have an appropriate vehicle to teach how to approach the design and regulation of large-scale infrastructures. Building on the proven educational benefits provided by games, the researchers propose to address the need for a new instrument by developing Blackout, a persistent, web browser-based, multiplayer online game about dynamic markets for electric power.Intellectual MeritThis project focuses on concept development for Blackout, in collaboration with an experienced game design professional with a proven track record. This design process emphasizes rules and play experience instead of other, often more costly aspects of game development, such as art, programming, marketing, documentation, and so on. The researchers and graduate students will be actively involved at various stages of this iterative design process, and draw on their respective expertise in distributed control systems and pricing, and power system dynamics and control, to specify the objectives and ensure that the rules of play and environment, while simplified, retain the main essential features and challenges as real power systems. At the conclusion of concept development, the researchers anticipate the creation of a working multiplayer prototype, playable from a remote Web browser. Broader ImpactsIf successful, games like Blackout will play a significant role in raising the public awareness about the challenges and significance of infrastructure design and regulation, and in training the next generation of engineers and scientists. The final prototype game will be made available online to the general public and the research community. The project will provide an opportunity for the involvement of undergraduate and graduate students and will result in a teaching vehicle that is likely to help engage nontraditional engineering students.