Blockchain for Decentralized Transactive Energy Management System in Networked Microgrids with Renewable Energy Resources

Prof. Mohammad Shahidehpour

Robert W. Galvin Center for Electricity Innovation

Illinois Institute of Technology

Chicago, Illinois 60616, USA

Technological and socioeconomic developments in distributed energy resources have promoted microgrids as promising alternatives to the traditional bulk power grid for electricity delivery. Microgrids are small-scale self-controllable power systems that interconnect on-site generation resources and loads for striking a local balance of energy production and consumption. Geographically-close microgrids are networked to broaden the merits of microgrids and eventually refine electricity service provisions across the power distribution system. Transactive energy, as the cross-section of technological, political and economic innovations, opens up the door to peer-to-peer autonomous electricity retail markets together with new business and operation models for power generation, delivery, and consumption. Through active participation in the decentralized transactive energy management process, networked microgrids collectively provide additional opportunities for improving the operational performance of power distribution systems. As networked microgrids are intrinsically cyber-physical systems that may unintentionally expose cybersecurity vulnerabilities to potential disruptive agents, blockchain is considered as an option that provides a transformative solution to address the cybersecurity and mutual-trust concerns through the application of cryptography and the execution of smart contracts. Accordingly, networked microgrids will interact in an automatic, credible and auditable manner for maintaining a greater degree of efficiency, reliability, resilience, and sustainability in electricity services offered to local communities. This presentation offers a vision and analyzes a scheme developed for microgrids that utilizes blockchain technologies to optimize transactive operations in power distribution systems. We conclude that blockchain technologies embedded in transactive energy will play a significant role in the evolution of traditional power distribution systems to active smart distribution networks.

Biography

 Dr. Mohammad Shahidehpour is a University Distinguished Professor, Bodine Chair Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Director of the Robert W. Galvin Center for Electricity Innovation at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). He has also been the Principal Investigator of $60M research grants and contracts on power system operation and control. His project on Perfect Power Systems has converted the entire IIT Campus to an islandable microgrid. His CSMART (Center for Smart Grid Applications, Research, and Technology) at IIT has promoted the smart grid cybersecurity research for managing the resilience of wireless networked communication and control systems in smart cities. His SPIKE initiative facilitated the design and the implementation of affordable microgrids in impoverished nations. He is the recipient of the 2009 honorary doctorate from the Polytechnic University of Bucharest. Dr. Shahidehpour was the recipient several technical awards including of the IEEE Burke Hayes Award for his research on hydrokinetics, IEEE/PES Outstanding Power Engineering Educator Award, IEEE/PES Ramakumar Family Renewable Energy Excellence Award, IEEE/PES Douglas M. Staszesky Distribution Automation Award, and the Edison Electric Institute’s Power Engineering Educator Award. He has co-authored 6 books and 750 technical papers on electric power system operation and planning, and served as the founding Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid. Dr. Shahidehpour is a Fellow of IEEE, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI), and a member of the US National Academy of Engineering (NAE).