Discussions on the form of future (network) scenarios at the second meeting of the Smart Grid LAB Hessen project advisory board

On 19 January, the advisory board of the Smart Grid LAB Hessen project met for the second time. This meeting was held online due to the pandemic.

Under the title “Future scenarios for the power grid in the Smart Grid LAB Hessen”, the participant discussions were animated and to some extent even controversial. As a starting point, there were a number of propositions put forward by Sophia Pfeffer and Till Neukamp from Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, which they had developed from the responses to questions distributed to the advisory board in advance. On the basis of the results of the discussion the researchers from Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences will be able to develop important content for the determination of future scenarios which are to be simulated in the Smart Grid LAB. At the end of the session, Brandi Gunn from Tractebel Engineering provided the opportunity for a look at the bigger picture and presented the framework of Smart Grid scenarios in an international context.

The Smart Grid LAB Hessen project kicked off in December 2020 and is being supported by the federal state of Hessen with funds from the ERDF with the objective of testing active control processes in the smart grid and all required functionalities under real-world conditions. The LAB is currently under construction at the site of Ingenieurbüro Pfeffer in Rödermark. It works with real voltages and currents and simulates sources and sinks with power electronics and real operating resources. By using real-time data, the transmission capacity of an existing power grid can be significantly increased, and the investment volume required for grid expansion limited. In this context, not only the control algorithms but also data security and resilience have a high priority. The project runs until March 2023.

The advisory board meeting was attended by the following:

Dirk Böllert - ADAICA GmbH
Till Sybel - A. Eberle GmbH & Co. KG
Dr. Christian Rüster - A. Eberle GmbH & Co. KG
Dr. Ilja Krybus - BearingPoint GmbH
Axel Hahn - Betonbau GmbH & Co. KG
Jürgen Gernandt - Energie Waldeck Frankenberg GmbH
David Petermann - e-netz Südhessen
Helmut Hofman - enwag energie- und wassergesellschaft mbh
Harald Zenke - North Channel Bank / Smart Grid Solutions GmbH
Eike Weldner - Städtische Werke Kassel Netz + Service GmbH
Rainer Preiss - Stadtwerke Bad Nauheim
Wolfgang Geis - Süwag / Syna GmbH
Jürgen Bruder - TÜV Hessen GmbH
Malte Berghaus - TÜV Nord EnSys GmbH & Co. KG
Lars Nehrkorn - Überlandwerk Groß-Gerau GmbH