Funding Program: SuNLaMP
SunShot Subprogram: Systems Integration
Project: Location: Sandia National Laboratory, Albuquerque, NM
SunShot Award Amount: $4,000,000
Awardee Cost Share: $809,572
This project, led by Sandia National Laboratory and supported by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, will accelerate Quasi Static Time Series (QSTS) simulation capabilities through the use of new and innovative methods for advanced time-series analysis. Currently, QSTS analysis is not commonly performed in photovoltaic (PV) interconnection studies because of the data requirements and computational burden. This project will address both of these issues by developing advanced QSTS methods that greatly reduce the required computational time and by developing high-proxy data sets.
Approach
This project will accelerate QSTS simulation using methods such as event-based simulation, linear power flow approximation, parallel processing of power flow solutions separable by time, and voltage drop time-series approximation. Each of these methods will contribute to speeding up the QSTS computation. The project team will seamlessly integrate equivalent reduced-order feeder models to precisely simulate grid impacts by significantly reducing the computational time required to solve the power flow time-series. This will enable QSTS analysis to become the industry-preferred PV impact assessment method.
Innovation
Current QSTS analysis tools require somewhere between 10-120 hours to complete, making it difficult for utilities to perform year-long analyses of PV impacts. Additionally, the data inputs, which include loads connected to a distribution circuit and distributed generation by interconnected PV systems, for QSTS analysis are burdensome because utilities rarely collect and store the necessary data at the required time-resolution. This project will achieve year-long high-resolution time series solutions that can be run in less than 5 minutes to assist utility decision support systems.