Collaborative Research: Planning for Uncertainty in Coupled Water-Power Distribution Networks

该项目的目标是开发在社区或城市的实际规模上联合运行市政饮用水和电力分配网络的方法。耗电的供水网络设备，如水泵，可以通过转移抽水负荷，为电网提供灵活性。水网给电网提供的灵活性提高了电网的可靠性，进而提高了水网的可靠性。此外，电网运行灵活性的提高降低了运营成本，可以帮助配电网络纳入更高的可再生能源渗透率。该项目将为不确定条件下的耦合水电网络制定运营规划和实时控制策略，制定灵活性经济合同，评估网络对新的运营/控制策略和经济机制的弹性，并更新这些新方法，以保持或提高当前的弹性水平。这项研究将有助于提高水电耦合系统的经济性、环境影响、可靠性和弹性。此外，该研究将通过与电力和水公用事业合作伙伴的合作产生实际影响。该小组将向研究界和实践者传播他们的成果，编写课程材料，并为代表性不足的研究生和本科生提供多学科研究经验。该项目将为优化、经济合同设计、弹性建模、电力系统和供水网络等领域做出贡献。任务1将开发方法来推进最先进的耦合水电网络建模，并解决两个网络耦合运行中出现的具有挑战性的随机优化问题。任务2将开发设计经济合同的方法，以确保水电公司的协调和客户的激励。任务3将推进谁面临基础设施易受灾害影响的公平性建模和分析。虽然以前的工作开发了一个总体框架来衡量人口中基本服务损失的不平等，但这并没有与详细的基础设施绩效模型相结合。该项目将建立这种关键的联系，提高考虑脆弱性中的潜在不平等的能力，这些不平等可能无意中从旨在改善系统性能的干预中产生。这对于避免对弱势亚群体产生负面的、意想不到的后果至关重要。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this project is to develop approaches for the joint operation of coupled municipal drinking water and electric power distribution networks at the physical scale of neighborhoods or cities. Electricity-consuming water network equipment such as water pumps can provide flexibility to electricity networks by shifting pumping load. Flexibility provided by the water network to the power network increases power network reliability, in turn increasing water network reliability. Further, increased flexibility in power network operation reduces operational costs and can help electric power distribution network incorporate higher penetrations of renewable energy resources. The project will develop operational planning and real-time control strategies for coupled water-power networks under uncertainty, develop economic contracts for flexibility, assess network resilience to new operational/control strategies and economic mechanisms, and update these new approaches to maintain or improve upon current levels of resilience. This research will help improve the economics, environmental impact, reliability, and resilience of coupled water-power systems. Further, the research will have practical impacts through collaboration with electric and water utility partners. The team will disseminate their results to the research community and practitioners, develop curriculum materials, and provide multidisciplinary research experiences for underrepresented graduate and undergraduate students.The project will contribute to the fields of optimization, economic contract design, resilience modeling, electric power systems, and water networks. Task 1 will develop approaches for advancing the state-of-the-art in coupled water-power network modeling and solving the challenging stochastic optimization problems that arise in the coupled operation of the two networks. Task 2 will develop approaches to design economic contracts to ensure coordination of the water and electric companies and incentivization of the customers. Task 3 will advance the modeling and analysis of equity in who faces infrastructure vulnerability from hazards. While previous work developed a general framework for measuring inequity in the loss of essential services across a population, this has not been integrated with detailed infrastructure performance models. This project will make this critical linkage, advancing the ability to consider potential inequities in vulnerability that may inadvertently arise from interventions intended to improve system performance. This is critical to avoid having negative, unintended consequences on vulnerable sub-populations.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.