CAREER: Deregulated Market for Flexible Transmission

实现美国的气候目标需要对新的输电基础设施进行大规模投资。NSF CAREER项目旨在通过提高现有传输网络的传输能力来大幅减少这种需求。这将通过设计新的市场来实现，为灵活输电的有效运行提供激励。预计这些激励措施将提高现有电网的利用率，并为创新铺平道路，使国家电网更加现代化、灵活、有弹性和经济。该项目的智力优势包括开发新的理论和方法，使灵活输电的解除管制和市场化运作成为可能，而不是今天的监管结构。在工程和经济学原理的指导下，该项目将确保电力流量保持在限制范围内，社会福利得到改善，市场收入充足。该项目更广泛的影响包括节省了大量的新输电项目成本，提高了国家电力基础设施的效率，并为采用更多的可再生能源发电提供了一条经济途径。此外，该项目还包括教育和推广活动，将提供优化、经济学和公共政策方面的前沿培训机会，为提高国家劳动力水平做出贡献。灵活传输，包括拓扑控制、节点电压相位控制和线路阻抗控制，可以显著提高现有网络的传输能力。尽管技术可行，但灵活输电的部署相当有限，主要原因是缺乏激励措施。该CAREER项目将根据系统状态，开发理论、方法和算法，为灵活输电的有效运行提供基于市场的激励。该项目将调查两种不同的市场设计，基于：(i)金融传输权的分配，以及（ii）边际价值支付。还将研究每种设计中行使市场力量的可能性，这将导致防止市场操纵的监管指导方针。设计的效率将根据三个标准进行严格测试：(i)社会福利改善，（ii）收入充足性，（iii）计算可追溯性。最终的市场设计，满足效率标准，将使灵活的传输技术的广泛应用。虽然该项目将建立一个线性市场，以确保与现有电力市场设计的兼容性，但将深入研究潮流方程非线性的影响。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。

Achieving the United States’ climate goals requires a massive level of investment in new power transmission infrastructure. This NSF CAREER project aims to substantially reduce this need by improving the transfer capability of the existing transmission network. This will be achieved by designing new markets that provide incentive for efficient operation of flexible transmission. It is expected that such incentives will lead to enhanced utilization of the existing grid and pave the way for innovation, making the nation’s power grid more modern, flexible, resilient, and economical. The intellectual merits of the project include development of new theories and methods that enable deregulated and market-based operation of flexible transmission, as opposed to today’s regulated structure. Guided by engineering and economics principles, the project will ensure that the power flows stay within the limits, social welfare is improved, and the market is revenue adequate. The broader impacts of the project include substantial savings in avoided new transmission project costs, enhancement of the efficiency of the nation’s electric power infrastructure and offering an economical pathway to adoption of increased renewable generation. Additionally, the project includes educational and outreach activities that will provide cutting-edge training opportunities in optimization, economics, and public policy, contributing to the advancement of the nation’s workforce. Flexible transmission, including topology control, nodal voltage phase control, and line impedance control, can significantly increase the transfer capability over the existing network. Despite the availability of the technology, deployment of flexible transmission has been rather limited, mainly due to lack of incentives. This CAREER project will develop theories, methods, and algorithms to offer market-based incentives for efficient operation of flexible transmission, based on the state of the system. The project will investigate two different market designs, based on: (i) allocation of financial transmission rights, and (ii) marginal value payments. The potential for exercise of market power within each design will also be studied, which will lead to regulatory guidelines for preventing market manipulation. The efficiency of the designs will be rigorously tested based on three criteria: (i) social welfare improvement, (ii) revenue adequacy, and (iii) computational tractability. The final market design, satisfying the efficiency criteria, will enable widespread utilization of flexible transmission technologies. While the project will formulate a linear market, ensuring compatibility with existing electricity market designs, the impacts of nonlinearity in power flow equations will be thoroughly investigated.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.