Hyperride
Hybrid Provision of Energy based on Reliability and Resiliency by the Integration of Dc Equipment
The Hyperride (Hybrid Provision of Energy based on Reliability and Resiliency by the Integration of Dc Equipment) project is funded by the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation Horizon 2020 with a total budget of around 8.2 million Euro over a period of four years.
Global climate change is critically related to human activity and the energy that powers it. Enhancing energy efficiency and sustainability is thus a key pillar of most policy initiatives. Currently, most power grids rely on alternating current (AC) because generators, motors and transformers use the induction principle. With increasing contributions from internal direct current (DC) based renewable energy sources, e-mobility and battery storages, low-voltage DC grids or DC coupled with AC in a hybrid network could enable more stable, efficient and sustainable electricity distribution at lower costs. The EU-funded HYPERRIDE project is developing the technologies to make this possible with planned demonstrations in a variety of use cases. All this will be accompanied by business models for the resulting products, services and applications.
The project HYPERRIDE contributes to the field implementation of DC and hybrid AC/DC grids. Starting with the definition of most relevant fields of application for DC grids (local microgrids, grid enforcement to overcome congestions, coupling of AC grid sections, etc.), the enabling technologies will be specified in detail on different levels. Starting from the system perspective, guidelines for grid planning and operation are developed. To optimize invest for the use case dependent use of assets available sizing tools are adapted for the field of DC grids. DC circuit breakers are key technologies for grid protection needed to overcome the main concerns related to these infrastructures. Therefore, HYPERRIDE will raise the TRL of the most promising approaches currently available with a main focus on MVDC breakers. To enable grid automation DC sensors are developed further to provide field ready devices to create data for optimal grid automation. Automation algorithms will be created, validated in a test platform and transferred towards demonstration. This also involves concepts and solutions for cyber security and fault detection. In case of grid faults necessary solutions are developed to prevent cascading effects. For fault prevention databases are created to trigger preventive measures. With demonstrations in three countries (Aachen/Germany, Lausanne/Switzerland, Terni/Italy) the project will showcase relevant and above-mentioned enabling technologies within a wide range of use cases. Benefits of the solutions will be evaluated, especially the integration potential of renewables with respect to conventional AC grids. Finally, business models are created for the products, services and applications in HYPERRIDE. Consequently, HYPERRIDE will actively identify and provide solutions to overcome barriers for a successful roll-out of new infrastructure concepts throughout Europe.
In order to achieve the ambitious project goals, a close international cooperation between industry and research institutions is established with AIT Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH (Austria) as the coordinator. In addition to AIT GmbH, RWTH Aachen University (Germany), Flexible Elektrische Netze FEN GmbH (Germany), SciBreak AB (Sweden), EPFL (Switzerland), Eaton Elektrotechnika SRO (Czech), Dr. Techn. Josef Zelisko Fabrik für Elektrotechnik und Maschienbau GmbH (Sustria), ENGINEERING – Ingegneria Informatica SPA (Italy), ASM Terni SPA (Italy), Emotion SRL (Italy) are associated as partners in this project. The participating research institutes of RWTH Aachen University are the Institute for Power Generation and Storage Systems (PGS) and the Institute for Automation of Complex Power Systems (ACS).