Open distributed intelligence platform for microgrids with solar and battery storage

9 February 2015 Geoff Zeiss

At DistribuTECH 2015, Duke Energy held a session about their Phase 2 project (COW II) of the Coalition of the Willing initiative.

Stuart Laval, Smart Grid Technology Manager at Duke, presented an overview of the COW II project.  At most utilities the current architecture  is a collection of  proprietary application silos with no field interoperability.  What interoperability there is is via the enterprise service bus in the central control office.  Duke is proposing a distributed intelligence platform (DIP) with seamless interoperability in the field.  Duke’s plan is to implement a Common Information Model (CIM) into an OpenFMB field message bus which is based on mature standards – OMG Data Distribution Service and Message Queue Telemetry Transport (MQTT) which is now an OASIS Standard.  CIM provides semantics in the form of standardized object model representations. 

P1000486abThe use case is a islandable microgrid.  The microgrid will include solar and battery storage and will use wireless to support field communication between all the devices on the distribution grid.

Some of the objectives of the COW II project are

  • Demonstrate operation of an islandable microgrid utilizing solar PV and battery storage.
  • Demonstrate a functioning distributed intelligence architecture.
  • Demonstrate interoperability based on CIM between open publish/subscribe standard protocols including DDS and MQTT.
  • Develop and demonstrate “edge of the grid” applications such as volt/var and solar smoothing.
  • Demonstrate live interoperability at DistribuTECH 2016.

P1000483abDuke has lined up 25 vendor partners to support the COW II effort.  For most types of equipment, there are two vendor partners that can provide the equipment.  For example, Elster and Itron manufacture smart meters.

A key part of the demonstration is a field message bus based on open standards.  Duke is working with a number of partners to support this effort.

  • Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP)
  • North American Energy Standards Board (NAESB)
  • National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) DOE INTEGRATE project
  • EPRI Integrated Grid program
  • CPS Energy “Grid of the Future” deployment in San Antonio

The Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP) has already created an OpenFMB working group to support this effort.

Geoff Zeiss

Geoff Zeiss

Geoff Zeiss has more than 20 years experience in the geospatial software industry and 15 years experience developing enterprise geospatial solutions for the utilities, communications, and public works industries. His particular interests include the convergence of BIM, CAD, geospatial, and 3D. In recognition of his efforts to evangelize geospatial in vertical industries such as utilities and construction, Geoff received the Geospatial Ambassador Award at Geospatial World Forum 2014. Currently Geoff is Principal at Between the Poles, a thought leadership consulting firm. From 2001 to 2012 Geoff was Director of Utility Industry Program at Autodesk Inc, where he was responsible for thought leadership for the utility industry program. From 1999 to 2001 he was Director of Enterprise Software Development at Autodesk. He received one of ten annual global technology awards in 2004 from Oracle Corporation for technical innovation and leadership in the use of Oracle. Prior to Autodesk Geoff was Director of Product Development at VISION* Solutions. VISION* Solutions is credited with pioneering relational spatial data management, CAD/GIS integration, and long transactions (data versioning) in the utility, communications, and public works industries. Geoff is a frequent speaker at geospatial and utility events around the world including Geospatial World Forum, Where 2.0, MundoGeo Connect (Brazil), Middle East Spatial Geospatial Forum, India Geospatial Forum, Location Intelligence, Asia Geospatial Forum, and GITA events in US, Japan and Australia. Geoff received Speaker Excellence Awards at GITA 2007-2009.

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