Congratulations for the 2014 recipients of the WISE-CISCO Systems Smart Grid Research Fund:

Armaghan Salehian

Grid capacity, reliability and efficient distribution of power have been among major challenges for traditional Ontario power grids in the past few years. Reliable distribution within these power grids will continue to depend on development of lighter and more efficient sensing units with much smaller maintenance costs in order to detect grid failures. The objective of Prof. Armaghan Salehian's research is to develop light-weight, more reliable and self-contained sensing units with much higher packaging efficiencies compared to the available sensors in the market to detect power outages and cascading failures in the grid. The proposed technology will be the first single chip Micro-Sensor solution with several advantages such as being self-contained which means that it will not rely on batteries for its operation while being about 50 times smaller and cheaper than any existing device in the market today. Thus, the advantage of being self-contained will reduce maintenance costs. The harvested energy will be stored in a super-capacitor to power the sensor. 

Lukasz Golab

As conventional power grids turn into smart power grids, smart meters are replacing traditional electricity meters. The main operational advantage of smart metering systems is their ability to automatically collect fine-grained (typically hourly) electricity consumption data, which enables accurate billing without having to send workers to customer premises to manually read the meters. Additionally, a new application area has emerged: smart meter data analytics. The vast amounts of data collected by smart metering systems can help understand electricity consumption patterns, thereby helping governments and utility companies plan for the future and consumers to reduce their bills. The market for smart grid data analytics is growing rapidly and is expected to reach over $4 billion by the year 2020. The goal of Professor Lukasz Golab's project is to investigate and implement new applications that leverage smart meter data.

 
Kankar Bhattacharya

Professor Kankar Bhattacharya's research sets out to develop stochastic modeling and optimization techniques for PEV charging station operation in smart distribution systems. Given that approximately 75% of Canada's electricity is generated without the use of fossil fuels, electrifying the transportation system is a promising solution to reduce Canada's GHG emissions. It is estimated by Natural Resource Canada that there will be at least 500,000 highway-capable plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) on Canadian roads by 2018, as well as a possibly larger number of hybrid-electric vehicles. Similar trend is observed in other countries. A critical infrastructure for transportation electrification is the charging station, which can be deployed at not only residential parking lots, but at parking lots of work places, shopping centers, and even street parking decks. With a fast-growing PEV penetration rate, the charging demand is expected to constitute a significant portion of the total electricity demand in the future smart grid. Optimizing the operation of charging stations is critical to ensure power system reliability while achieving certain operating objectives, such as maximizing the profit of charging stations and minimizing the losses of the distribution system.

WISE-CISCO Systems Smart Grid Research Fund awards the total of $40,000 per year to faculty members in areas of relevance to the Fund. We thank CISCO Systems Canada for their generous contribution. We thank all applicants for their submissions and encourage interested candidates to stay tuned for the upcoming 2015 Call for Applications.

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