Control of Renewable Integrated Systems Targeting Advanced Landmarks

The Coordination Action aims to contribute to the integration and strengthening of European research on Renewable Energy Sources and associated power converters, controllers and combined use. The proposal is a step forward in securing a leading role for Europe in sustainable energy systems, strategically important to some EC Programme objectives: large scale implementation of Distributed Energy Resources (DER), energy storage technologies and systems for grid connected applications. It is focused on the development of key enabling technologies for distributed / smart energy networks, with high power quality and service security. The technical issues to be coordinated are concerned with solar, wind and micro-hydro systems control in conjunction with compensatory energy storage systems (fuel cells, hydrogen) and connection to the grid. The activities achieve the exchange of expertise through visits, longer studies and meetings, enabling the coordination of the DER modeling, simulation and system integration work, leading to the identification of controllers that enable high efficiency operation and solutions to grid connection issues. First year’s visits and longer study findings will be reported at a general meeting. Further visits are scheduled for the second year. Open access events will be organized to raise public awareness on sustainability and renewable energy. A final general meeting will collate the exchange of expertise into conclusive reports. Intellectual property protection, the dissemination of knowledge beyond the consortium through publications, conference participation, public events and websites will also be tackled. The foreseen benefits include: increased awareness and enhanced knowledge on sustainable energy systems, both for participants and general public, correlated European research in DER and the identification of niche areas for further coordinated research, to comply with EC/national policies. An European expert group will be implicitly set up.