This paper investigates the combustion phasing control of natural gas-diesel engines. In this study, the combustion phasing is influenced by manipulating the start and the duration of the diesel injection. Instead of using both degrees of freedom to control the center of combustion only, we propose a method that simultaneously controls the combustion phasing and minimizes the amount of diesel used. Minimizing the amount of diesel while keeping the center of combustion at a constant value is formulated as an optimization problem with an equality constraint. A combination of feedback control and extremum seeking is used to solve this optimization problem online. The necessity to separate the different time scales is discussed and a structure is proposed that facilitates this separation for this specific example. The proposed method is validated by experiments on a test bench.

We evaluate and compare two common methods, artificial neural networks (ANN) and support vector regression (SVR), for predicting energy productions from a solar photovoltaic (PV) system in Florida 15 min, 1 h and 24 h ahead of time. A hierarchical approach is proposed based on the machine learning algorithms tested. The production data used in this work corresponds to 15 min averaged power measurements collected from 2014. The accuracy of the model is determined using computing error statistics such as mean bias error (MBE), mean absolute error (MAE), root mean square error (RMSE), relative MBE (rMBE), mean percentage error (MPE) and relative RMSE (rRMSE). This work provides findings on how forecasts from individual inverters will improve the total solar power generation forecast of the PV system.

Electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers are employing cylindrical format cells in the construction of the vehicles’ battery systems. There is evidence to suggest that both the academic and industrial communities have evaluated cell degradation due to vibration and other forms of mechanical loading. The primary motivation is often the need to satisfy the minimum requirements for safety certification. However, there is limited research that quantifies the durability of the battery and in particular, how the cells will be affected by vibration that is representative of a typical automotive service life (e.g., 100,000 miles). This paper presents a study to determine the durability of commercially available 18,650 cells and quantifies both the electrical and mechanical vibration-induced degradation through measuring changes in cell capacity, impedance and natural frequency. The impact of the cell state of charge (SOC) and in-pack orientation is also evaluated. Experimental results are presented... [more]

This paper focuses on the space charge behavior in oil-paper insulation systems used in power transformers. It begins with the importance of understanding the space charge behavior in oil-paper insulation systems, followed by the introduction of the pulsed electrostatic technique (PEA). After that, the research progress on the space charge behavior of oil-paper insulation during the recent twenty years is critically reviewed. Some important aspects such as the environmental conditions and the acoustic wave recovery need to be addressed to acquire more accurate space charge measurement results. Some breakthroughs on the space charge behavior of oil-paper insulation materials by the research team at the University of Southampton are presented. Finally, future work on space charge measurement of oil-paper insulation materials is proposed.

A new battery simulator based on a hybrid model is proposed in this paper for dynamic discharging behavior and runtime predictions in existing electronic simulation environments, e.g., PSIM, so it can help power circuit designers to develop and optimize their battery-powered electronic systems. The hybrid battery model combines a diffusion model and a switching overpotential model, which automatically switches overpotential resistance mode or overpotential voltage mode to accurately describe the voltage difference between battery electro-motive force (EMF) and terminal voltage. Therefore, this simulator can simply run in an electronic simulation software with less computational efforts and estimate battery performances by further considering nonlinear capacity effects. A linear extrapolation technique is adopted for extracting model parameters from constant current discharging tests, so the EMF hysteresis problem is avoided. For model validation, experiments and simulations in MATLAB a... [more]

This paper presents an algorithm to translate building topology in an object-oriented architectural building model (Building Information Modeling, BIM) into an object-oriented physical-based energy performance simulation by using an object-oriented programming approach. Our algorithm demonstrates efficient mapping of building components in a BIM model into space boundary conditions in an object-oriented physical modeling (OOPM)-based building energy model, and the translation of building topology into space boundary conditions to create an OOPM model. The implemented command, TranslatingBuildingTopology, using an object-oriented programming approach, enables graphical representation of the building topology of BIM models and the automatic generation of space boundaries information for OOPM models. The algorithm and its implementation allow coherent object-mapping from BIM to OOPM and facilitate the definition of space boundaries information during model translation for building thermal... [more]

Active Network Management (ANM) enables a microgrid to optimally dispatch the active/reactive power of its Renewable Distributed Generation (RDG) and Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) units in real time. Thus, a microgrid with high penetration of RDGs can handle their uncertainties and variabilities to achieve the stable operation using ANM. However, the actual power flow in the line connecting the main grid and microgrid may deviate significantly from the day-ahead bids if the bids are determined without consideration of the real-time adjustment through ANM, which will lead to a substantial imbalance cost. Therefore, this study proposes a formulation for obtaining an optimal bidding which reflects the change of power flow in the connecting line by real-time adjustment using ANM. The proposed formulation maximizes the expected profit of the microgrid considering various network and physical constraints. The effectiveness of the proposed bidding strategy is verified through the simul... [more]

In this study, we investigate power generation by reverse electrodialysis in a dense silica membrane that is between two NaCl solutions with various combinations of concentrations. Each silica membrane is fabricated by depositing a silica layer on a porous alumina substrate via chemical vapor deposition. The measured potential-current (V-I) characteristics of the silica membrane are used to obtain the transference number, diffusion potential, and electrical resistance. We develop empirical correlations for the transference number and the area-specific resistance, and present the results of power generation by reverse electrodialysis using the fabricated silica membranes. The highest measured power density is 0.98 mW/m². In addition, we develop a contour map of the power density as a function of NaCl concentrations on the basis of the empirical correlations. The contour map shows that a power output density of 1.2 mW/m² is achievable with the use of silica membranes and is sufficient to... [more]

A two-dimensional, single-phase, isothermal, multicomponent, transient model is built to investigate the transport phenomena in unitized regenerative fuel cells (URFCs) under the condition of switching from the fuel cell (FC) mode to the water electrolysis (WE) mode. The model is coupled with an electrochemical reaction. The proton exchange membrane (PEM) is selected as the solid electrolyte of the URFC. The work is motivated by the need to elucidate the complex mass transfer and electrochemical process under operation mode switching in order to improve the performance of PEM URFC. A set of governing equations, including conservation of mass, momentum, species, and charge, are considered. These equations are solved by the finite element method. The simulation results indicate the distributions of hydrogen, oxygen, water mass fraction, and electrolyte potential response to the transient phenomena via saltation under operation mode switching. The hydrogen mass fraction gradients are smal... [more]

Nowadays offshore wind energy is the renewable energy source with the highest growth. Offshore wind farms are composed of large and complex wind turbines, requiring a high level of reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS). Firms are employing robust remote condition monitoring systems in order to improve RAMS, considering the difficulty to access the wind farm. The main objective of this research work is to optimise the maintenance management of wind farms through the fault probability of each wind turbine. The probability has been calculated by Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) employing the Binary Decision Diagram (BDD) in order to reduce the computational cost. The fault tree presented in this paper has been designed and validated based on qualitative data from the literature and expert from important European collaborative research projects. The basic events of the fault tree have been prioritized employing the criticality method in order to use resources efficiently. E... [more]

Smart grids have been constructed so as to guarantee the security and stability of the power grid in recent years. Power transformers are a most vital component in the complicated smart grid network. Any transformer failure can cause damage of the whole power system, within which the failures caused by overloading cannot be ignored. This research gives a new insight into overload capability assessment of transformers. The hot-spot temperature of the winding is the most critical factor in measuring the overload capacity of power transformers. Thus, the hot-spot temperature is calculated to obtain the duration running time of the power transformers under overloading conditions. Then the overloading probability is fitted with the mature and widely accepted Weibull probability density function. To guarantee the accuracy of this fitting, a new objective function is proposed to obtain the desired parameters in the Weibull distributions. In addition, ten different mutation scenarios are adopt... [more]

Recently there have been large advances in energy technologies for battery-operated systems, including green energy resources and high capacity batteries. The effective use of battery energy resources in wireless infrastructure networks to improve the versatility and reliability of wireless communications is an important issue. Emerging applications of smart cities, Internet of Things (IoT), and emergency responses highly rely on the basic communication network infrastructures that enable ubiquitous network connections. However, energy consumption by nodes in a wireless infrastructure network depends on the transmissions of other nodes in the network. Considering this inter-dependence is necessary to achieve efficient provision of energy in wireless networks. This paper studies the issue of energy provision for wireless relay nodes in Wireless Multihop Infrastructures (WMI) assuming constraints on the total energy provision. We introduce a scheme of Energy Provision Matching (Matching-... [more]

The application of enhanced oil recovery (EOR) in offshore oil fields has received significant attention due to the potentially enormous amount of recoverable oil. However, EOR application offshore is in its very early stage due to conditions that are more complex than onshore oil fields, owing to the unique parameters present offshore. Therefore, successful EOR applications in offshore oil fields require different screening criteria than those for conventional onshore applications. A comprehensive database for onshore applications of EOR processes together with a limited offshore EOR application database are analyzed in this paper, and the important parameters for successful offshore application are incorporated into the new EOR screening criteria. In this paper, screening criteria to determine acceptable EOR processes for offshore fields, including hydrocarbon gas miscible, CO₂ miscible, and polymer processes, are presented. Suggested screening criteria for these EOR processes compri... [more]

Stopping the plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) once and maintaining the film in a vacuum for 30 s were performed. This was done several times during the formation of a film of i-layer microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) used in thin-film silicon tandem solar cells. This process aimed to reduce defect regions which occur due to collision with neighboring grains as the film becomes thicker. As a result, high crystallinity (Xc) of μc-Si:H was obtained. Eventually, a solar cell using this process improved the conversion efficiency by 1.3% (0.14 points), compared with a normal-condition cell. In this paper, we propose an easy method to improve the conversion efficiency with PECVD.

A predictive current control strategy can realize flexible regulation of three-phase grid-tied converters based on system behaviour prediction and cost function minimization. However, when the predictive current control strategy with conventional switching patterns is adopted, the predicted duration time for voltage vectors turns out to be negative in some cases, especially under the conditions of bidirectional power flows and transient situations, leading to system performance deteriorations. This paper aims to clarify the real reason for this phenomenon under bidirectional power flows, i.e., rectifier mode and inverter mode, and, furthermore, seeks to propose effective solutions. A detailed analysis of instantaneous current variations under different conditions was conducted. An enhanced predictive current control strategy with improved switching patterns was then proposed. An experimental platform was built based on a commercial converter produced by Danfoss, and moreover, relative... [more]

The efficiency of fiscal support for electricity generation from renewable energy sources (RES-E) is a multifaceted notion that cannot be adequately described by a single metric. Efficiency is related to the ability of a policy measure to support deployment without creating negative feedback effects. These negative effects may stem from saturation of the grid’s ability to absorb an increased amount of RES-E power, the inability of regulatory bodies to cope with the larger workload due to the increased number of projects requesting permits or from rent-seeking behavior. Furthermore, the primary rationale for feed-in tariffs (FITs) and other fiscal support schemes is that increased deployment of RES-E technologies will lead to reductions in costs and increases in efficiency. As a result, the efficiency of an RES-E support policy should be also judged by its ability to capitalize on cost reductions. Overall, we present an approach to facilitate ongoing assessments of the efficiency of sup... [more]

The renewable energy industry is undergoing continuous improvement and development worldwide, wind energy being one of the most relevant renewable energies. This industry requires high levels of reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS) for wind turbines. The blades are critical components in wind turbines. The objective of this research work is focused on the fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) of the wind turbine blades. The FDD approach is composed of a robust condition monitoring system (CMS) and a novel signal processing method. CMS collects and analyses the data from different non-destructive tests based on acoustic emission. The acoustic emission signals are collected applying macro-fiber composite (MFC) sensors to detect and locate cracks on the surface of the blades. Three MFC sensors are set in a section of a wind turbine blade. The acoustic emission signals are generated by breaking a pencil lead in the blade surface. This method is used to simulate the ac... [more]

ITU-T G.9904 standard, also known as PoweRline Intelligent Metering Evolution (PRIME), is a Power Line Communications standard for advanced metering, grid control and asset monitoring defined by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). In this paper, an analysis about how different characteristics of the communication channel and types of noise might affect the system performance is carried out. This study is based on simulations of the PRIME physical layer using different channel characteristics and transmission parameters. The conclusions obtained are very valuable for better understanding the behavior of the ITU-T G.9904 (PRIME) standard in the field, allowing future improvements in deployment strategies and equipment design.

The modular high temperature gas-cooled reactor (MHTGR) is a typical small modular reactor (SMR) that offers simpler, standardized and safer modular design by being factory built, requiring smaller initial capital investment, and having a shorter construction period. Thanks to its small size, the MHTGRs could be beneficial in providing electric power to remote areas that are deficient in transmission or distribution and in generating local power for large population centers. Based on the multi-modular operation scheme, the inherent safety feature of the MHTGRs can be applicable to large nuclear plants of any desired power rating. The MHTGR-based nuclear steam supplying system (NSSS) is constituted by an MHTGR, a side-by-side arranged helical-coil once-through steam generator (OTSG) and some connecting pipes. Due to the side-by-side arrangement, there is a tight coupling effect between the MHTGR and OTSG. Moreover, there always exists the parameter perturbation of the NSSSs. Thus, it is... [more]

High availability is crucial for industrial Ethernet networks as well as Ethernet-based control systems such as automation networks and substation automation systems (SAS). Since standard Ethernet does not support fault tolerance capability, the high availability of Ethernet networks can be increased by using redundancy protocols. Various redundancy protocols for Ethernet networks have been developed and standardized, such as rapid spanning tree protocol (RSTP), media redundancy protocol (MRP), parallel redundancy protocol (PRP), high-availability seamless redundancy (HSR) and others. RSTP and MRP have switchover delay drawbacks. PRP provides zero recovery time, but requires a duplicate network infrastructure. HSR operation is similar to PRP, but HSR uses a single network. However, the standard HSR protocol is mainly applied to ring-based topologies and generates excessively unnecessary redundant traffic in the network. In this paper, we develop a new switching node for the HSR protoco... [more]

Electrode materials are critical for microbial fuel cells (MFC) since they influence the construction and operational costs. This study introduces a simple and efficient electrode material in the form of palm kernel shell activated carbon (AC) obtained in tropical regions. The novel introduction of this material is also targeted at introducing an inexpensive and durable electrode material, which can be produced in rural communities to improve the viability of MFCs. The maximum voltage and power density obtained (under 1000 Ω load) using an H-shaped MFC with AC as both anode and cathode electrode material was 0.66 V and 1.74 W/m³, respectively. The power generated by AC was as high as 86% of the value obtained with the extensively used carbon paper. Scanning electron microscopy and Denaturing Gradient Gel Electrophoresis (DGGE) analysis of AC anode biofilms confirmed that electrogenic bacteria were present on the electrode surface for substrate oxidation and the formation of nanowires.

Turkey’s electricity mix is dominated by fossil fuels, but the country has ambitious future targets for renewable and nuclear energy. At present, environmental impacts of electricity generation in Turkey are unknown so this paper represents a first attempt to fill this knowledge gap. Taking a life cycle approach, the study considers eleven impacts from electricity generation over the period 1990⁻2014. All 516 power plants currently operational in Turkey are assessed: lignite, hard coal, natural gas, hydro, onshore wind and geothermal. The results show that the annual impacts from electricity have been going up steadily over the period, increasing by 2⁻9 times, with the global warming potential being higher by a factor of five. This is due to a four-fold increase in electricity demand and a growing share of fossil fuels. The impact trends per unit of electricity generated differ from those for the annual impacts, with only four impacts being higher today than in 1990, including the glob... [more]

A multi-objective optimization algorithm is proposed in this paper to increase the penetration level of renewable energy sources (RESs) in distribution networks by intelligent management of plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) storage. The proposed algorithm is defined to manage the reverse power flow (PF) from the distribution network to the upstream electrical system. Furthermore, a charging algorithm is proposed within the proposed optimization in order to assure PEV owner’s quality of service (QoS). The method uses genetic algorithm (GA) to increase photovoltaic (PV) penetration without jeopardizing PEV owners’ (QoS) and grid operating limits, such as voltage level of the grid buses. The method is applied to a part of the Danish low voltage (LV) grid to evaluate its effectiveness and capabilities. Different scenarios have been defined and tested using the proposed method. Simulation results demonstrate the capability of the algorithm in increasing solar power penetration in the grid up t... [more]

A series of mono- and di-branched donor-π-acceptor charge-separated dyes incorporating triphenylamine as a donor and either Dalton’s or benzothiadiazole group as strong acceptors was synthesized and its fundamental properties relevant to the sensitization of nanocrystalline NiO investigated. The dyes exhibited an intense visible absorption band with a strong charge transfer character favorable to NiO sensitization, shifting the electron density from the donor to the acceptor branches. Nevertheless, the computed exciton binding energy is circa twice that of a common literature standard (P1), suggesting a more difficult charge separation. When tested in p-type dye-sensitized solar cells the dyes successfully sensitized NiO electrodes, with photocurrent densities about half than that of the reference compound. Being recombination kinetics comparable, the larger photocurrent generated by P1 agrees with the superior charge separation capability originating by its smaller exciton binding ene... [more]

Phase change materials (PCM) in the construction industry became attractive because of several interesting attributes, such as thermo-physical parameters, open air atmospheric condition usage, cost and the duty structure requirement. Thermal performance optimization of PCMs in terms of proficient storage of a large amount of heat or cold in a finite volume remains a challenging task. Implementation of PCMs in buildings to achieve thermal comfort for a specific climatic condition in Iraq is our main focus. From this standpoint, the present paper reports the experimental and numerical results on the lowering of heat flux inside a residential building using PCM, which is composed of oil (40%) and wax (60%). This PCM (paraffin), being plentiful and cost-effective, is extracted locally from waste petroleum products in Iraq. Experiments are performed with two rooms of identical internal dimensions in the presence and absence of PCM. A two-dimensional numerical transient heat transfer model i... [more]