Energy management in distribution systems has gained attention in recent years. Coordination of electricity generation and consumption is crucial to save energy, reduce energy prices and achieve global emission targets. Due to the importance of the subject, this paper provides a literature review on recent research on energy management systems and classifies the works based on several factors including energy management goals, the approaches taken for performing energy management and solution algorithms. Furthermore, the paper reviews some of the most proficient techniques and methodologies adopted or developed to address energy management problem and provides a table to compare such techniques. The current challenges and limitations of energy management systems are explained and some future research directions have been provided at the end of the paper.

Energy management (EM) has become very attractive in smart grid era for both industry and academia. EM in a power distribution system (PDS) can reduce the system losses, operational costs and emissions, and increases system’s reliability, voltage stability and efficiency. This paper expands the PDS using different distributed energy resources (DERs) and observes their impacts on EM success, operational costs, system losses, and emissions. Moreover, the impacts of integrating reactive sources (RSs), energy storage systems (ESSs), and electric vehicles (EVs) on the system’s operational performance is investigated. An index is defined to measure the energy management success rate (EMSR) and several case studies are created for investigating variety of system expansion options individually and collectively. Furthermore, a new reliability index, namely reliability index success rate (RISR), is defined and sensitivity analysis are presented to investigate the DERs impacts on system’s voltage controllability and the defined reliability index. A new hybrid PSO-TS optimization algorithm is developed, and the well-known PG&E 69-bus distribution network is selected for the simulations. Several case studies presented in the paper provide a clear understanding of the impacts of integrating different resources on the EM as well as other operational aspects of a PDS. The results reveal that the system expansion using DERs with different capacities along with EM strategies could have significant impacts on PDS performance depending on the DERs types’ and capacities. Due to their availability and low operational costs, gas turbine further improves the performance indices comparing to the renewables that have uncertain availability and to diesel generators with their high operational costs.

Energy management in smart grids have gained interest in the utility industries. Different types of energy resources are being used and the need for their accurate modeling is becoming more evident. To investigate the importance of accurate modeling, this paper analyzes cost and emission models of different types of generators including gas turbine, coal-fire, diesel, and biomass for energy management. For this purpose, two sample models are presented for each generator and their calculated costs and emissions are plotted and compared. The case studies provide an overview of the impact of selecting different generators and its modeling approach on emission and cost for a sustainable energy management system.

We developed a dynamic model to find the optimum control strategy by integrating various energy sources in a growing power system in South East Asia. We take Bangladesh Power System as an example for case study to demonstrate the applicability of the model. According to some recent study, the major energy source, natural gas that generates almost 60 percent of the total energy in Bangladesh will be depleted within 20 to 25 years. This is the main reason that the policy makers of this country want to increase the energy production using a coal-based thermal plant which is environmentally detrimental for a tropical country such as Bangladesh that is mostly a delta formed by two major rivers from the Himalayas (Ganges-Brahmaputra). By considering the adverse effects on human/animal health and climate, it has become urgent for the country to gradually replace polluting and expensive energy sources with alternative sustainable energy sources without adversely affecting the economy of power generation. We developed a model to optimize energy generation by reducing the uses of dirty (coal) and expensive (liquid fuel) energy sources with clean and available generators. At the same, time we minimized the cost of power generation.

Multi-microgrids have gained interest in academics and industry in recent years. Multi-microgrid (MG) allows the integration of different distributed energy resources (DERs), including intermittent renewables and controllable local generators, and provides a more flexible, reliable, and efficient power grid. This research formulates and proposes a solution for finding optimal location and operation of mobile energy storage (MES) in multi-MG power distribution systems (PDS) with different resources during extreme events to maximize system resiliency. For this purpose, a multi-stage event-based system resiliency index is defined and the impact of the Internet of things (IoT) application in MES operation in multi-MG systems is investigated. Moreover, the demand and price uncertainty impact on multi-MG operational performance indices is presented. This research uses a popular PG & E 69-bus multi-MG power distribution network for simulation and case studies. A new hybrid PSO-TS optimization algorithm is constructed for the simulations to better understand the contributions of MES units and different DERs and IoT on the operational aspects of a multi-MG system. The results obtained from the simulations illustrate that optimal operation of MES and other energy resources, along with the corresponding energy sharing strategies, significantly improves the distribution system operational performance.