The ISGT Conference will host 8 panel sessions, spread over the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. This page gives an overview of these panels. Use the following links to quickly jump to the description of a particular panel:

• Panel 1: Coordination of flexible energy prosumers in integrated urban energy systems
• Panel 2: Localization in Electricity Markets: Moving down to the Distribution Grids
• Panel 3: Digital Twin
  
• Panel 4: Evolution of power systems to smart grids – EMPOWER project paradigm
• Panel 5: Increasing the flexibility of the European power system: four large scale demonstrators on the transmission grid from the OSMOSE H2020 project
  
• Panel 6: Flexibility options for ~100% renewable energy systems: demand response and sector coupling
• Panel 7: Ancillary Services provided by power-electronics interfaced Distributed Renewable Energy Sources connected in distribution grids
• Panel 8: Real-time simulation and HIL testing: validating technologies for a smarter, more sustainable grid

Monday 26th of October

Panel 1: Coordination of flexible energy prosumers in integrated urban energy systems

Monday 26th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

Urban environments are characterized by a high density of energy consumption, and tight constraints on local development (including network infrastructure). The implication is that while initiating the energy transition in urban environments cannot be postponed, the transition pathways must continuously adapt to local conditions and future developments. Against this background, it is essential to unlock the flexibility offered by energy consumers in close proximity, and across different energy vectors, making use of the additional flexibility offered by local sources of energy (prosumers) and the proliferation of IoT-enabled devices. This session brings together panelists that address this challenge from technical, regulatory and socio-economic perspectives. They will present and discuss the potential benefits of unlocking prosumer flexibility, and how these can be achieved in ways that are feasible, fair and resilient.

Panel 2: Localization in Electricity Markets: Moving down to the Distribution Grids

Monday 26th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

Local markets for electricity are gaining interest from academic and industrial researchers alike. At the level of the transmission networks and wholesale electricity markets, locational aspects have been included in the market clearing procedure for decades now. Currently, one of the energy transition challenges is to develop local market mechanisms for the distribution level of the electricity system. These mechanisms should be (1) fair, transparent and posing the right incentives to all stakeholders, (2) scalable, robust, increasing resiliency, and (3) connecting to the wholesale markets such that local and global stakes are balanced.

Throughout Europe, there are multiple initiatives investigating the technical and commercial feasibility of local market mechanisms. In this panel, we will seek discussion between researchers and experts from academics and industry to identify open questions and set the R&D agenda, based on a common understanding of the current state of the art.

Panel 3: Digital Twin

Monday 26th, 18:00 – 19:45 CET

The term “digital twin” is hot: An established method in avionics or automotive industry now enters new sectors, power systems being one of them. A digital twin represents some real (cyber/physical/social) system in a digital fashion. It can represent the past (forensics, analytics), the present (dashboard), or the future (predictive controls or maintenance, scenario optimization). Depending on the depth of the used models, it can give insights into hidden dynamics, risks, and optima. There are many situations and locations in the power system where digital twins can help: as decision support in the control room, embedded in a substation controller, as a planning tool, or on markets. This panel invites a group of experts, both from research and practice to confront the audience with the bare facts on digital twins in order to discuss their use and limits for power systems and smart grids. The panelists will pitch their propositions as thesis and antithesis, the audience will vote on that. After an interactive discussion with the audience, the vote is repeated, assessed, and summarized.

Tuesday 27th of October

Panel 4: Evolution of power systems to smart grids – EMPOWER project paradigm

Tuesday 27th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

In this panel, the lessons learned so far from the EMPOWER project will be discussed by speakers that forms a blend of academia and industry. In particular, this panel will discuss the benefits of the application of a key technology such as the synchronized measurement technology to a real power system in the view of the challenges that the islanded nature of the Cyprus power system pose. Several other aspects such as the real time applications that the synchronized measurement technology enables as well as the potential of storage in an islanded power system will also be discussed.

Panel 5: Increasing the flexibility of the European power system: four large scale demonstrators on the transmission grid from the OSMOSE H2020 project

Tuesday 27th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

Flexibility can be defined as the ability of the power system to adapt to variations of the demand, the generation and the grid. New challenges are arising like the increasing penetration of RES but new solutions are also emerging like smarter controls or large scale storage. The OSMOSE H2020 project (2018-2021) aims at enhancing the flexibility of the European power system especially through four large scale demonstrators lead by Transmission System operators: RTE, REE, TERNA and ELES. These demonstrations covers various innovations on flexibility services and providers: grid forming, multi-services by hybrid storage, near real-time cross border exchanges, smart zonal energy management system. Each demo will present in 15 minutes its objectives and current status. A roundtable will be the occasion to discuss with the audience the following questions:

• How could these demos be replicated and extended in Europe, for what benefits? Are there barriers to overcome?
• How could the transmission grid be even more flexible and accelerate the energy transition?

Wednesday 28th of October

Panel 6: Flexibility options for ~100% renewable energy systems: demand response and sector coupling

Wednesday 28th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

For large-scale integration of renewable energy, power systems must provide abundant flexibility to accommodate high shares of variable and uncertain renewable resources. Electrification is also becoming the most promising option to bring renewable energy to other sectors, thus greatly increasing (unconventional) electric demand, which poses new challenges and opportunities to the power system. In this panel session, we present different flexibility sources, their modelling and economic challenges for optimal planning and operation of power systems. These flexibility options include demand response, storage, and flexible sector coupling, e.g., power2gas (H2), power2mobility (EVs), and power2heat.

Panel 7: Ancillary Services provided by power-electronics interfaced Distributed Renewable Energy Sources connected in distribution grids

Wednesday 28th, 10:30 – 12:15 CET

Although power-electronics interfaced Distributed Renewable Energy Sources (PEI-DRES) are highly proliferated at distribution systems, their intermittent and inertia-less nature still prohibits the overall decommission of bulk synchronous generators (SGs), whose inherent properties are the basis of robust and stable transmission systems. Towards this direction, the increased controllability of PEI-DRES should be exploited so as they can provide Ancillary Services (AS) similarly to SGs. This panel session will provide a further insight on this topic through the ongoing research in the H2020 EU project EASY-RES.

Panel 8: Real-time simulation and HIL testing: validating technologies for a smarter, more sustainable grid

Wednesday 28th, 18:00 – 19:45 CET

Real-time simulation and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing has been used in the power industry for over twenty-five years. Originally developed as a solution for flexibly testing the control and protection associated with HVDC projects, the application of the technology is now widespread and varied, and today real-time simulators are used particularly effectively in the smart grid technologies space. The devices associated with and required by smart grids have the potential to interact with eachother and with existing technologies, and given the fast-acting nature of modern control and protection systems, the tools required to study them in detail must be capable of representing subcycle phenomena. Real-time simulators offer an electromagnetic transient representation of the power system along with the ability to connect devices in a closed-loop with the simulated network for flexible, controlled, and safe testing prior to deployment. This panel session highlights recent exciting projects from real-time simulator users validating and de-risking enabling technologies for a smarter, more sustainable grid.