he Saturday prior to APEC 2014, at the OMNI Hotel in Fort Worth, TX, PSMA and the IEEE PELS combined their efforts to bring industry and academia experts together in a workshop focused on the impact of power electronics on the design of large energy efficient buildings. The workshop, chaired by Dr. Phil Krein of the University of Illinois, featured seven speakers from the US and Taiwan.

The workshop was conducted in two sessions; the first focused on large buildings, their planning and design process as well as life cycle costs analysis and tradeoffs. Dr. Jim Cale of NREL in Golden Colorado gave an enlightening talk on what the National Renewable Energy Lab has designed and built in Golden, Colorado. Dr. Cale explained how a large building can be designed for Zero-Net Energy performance, what truly innovative thinking can produce when a team of stakeholders works through the planning, design, and construction together. The result of the Effort and NREL was presented and discussed in detail from renewable energy generation, energy storage, microgrids, appliance testing, behavioral research and analysis of results in real time. There is a lot that impacts power electronics in his presentation.

Dave Bodenshatz of KJWW Engineering Consultants followed Dr. Cale with a fascinating discussion of Life Cycle Analysis and Cost Tradeoffs in large buildings. Dave presented his work with Dr. Phil Krein on the new Engineering and Computer building at the University of Illinois. What he presented opened a lot of minds to the energy savings technologies that were considered and thrown out, as well as to the ones that did provide savings over the life cycle. The analysis of the life cycle costs considering 1st costs of construction, maintenance costs, and warranty and replacement costs proved surprising. Dave explained that doing this type of analysis can really provide payback in the life cycle of the building and while Zero-Net energy buildings are not cheap, they can save significant energy.

Dr. Tsai Fu Wu of the National Tsing Hua University of Taiwan treated us to a look at Taiwan’s Efforts in renewable energy and an insight into the research projects his EPERL lab is conducting. Dr. WU explained the plans of the Taiwan government in renewable energy and how his research in harmonizing the energy of the AC and DC grids in Taiwan through the use of DC nanogrids. Dr. Wu’s research into the use of Bi-directional inverters provides a way to effectively balance the energy use of the AC and DC grids the nation is creating.

The morning session finished with four breakout sessions that discussed key points that invited further discussion.

Dr. Krein presented a lunch review of the new Engineering and Computer building at the University of Illinois. Where the planning, research and analysis we have discussed was put into play and resulted in a building that introduces many of these leading edge concepts in energy savings. The building is in the last stages of completion and will be home to classes in August of this year.

The second session in the afternoon introduced the topic of Non Invasive Load Monitoring (NILM). Dr. Tom Habetler of Georgia Tech covered many of the basic concepts and driving functions for being able to apply Artificial intelligence and power electronics to electrical load detection, categorization, control and analysis for residential applications. Most of these techniques will enable significant savings in terms of energy but also in terms of behavioral modification and pre-failure detection of electrical equipment.

Dr. Steven Leeb of MIT then presented a fascinating presentation and demonstration of NILM as applied to large installations such as military posts, hospitals, and commercial structures. Dr. Leeb gave fascinating demonstration of position detection through injecting a signal into lighting within a room and detecting position of within the room through receivers. One example of detection involved placing a detecting device around a conduit and being able to identify activities as they occur on a military outpost from remote locations, then using artificial intelligence to take action on those observations to improve service and supplies to the facility.

Dr. Dushan Boroyevich of CPES at Virginia Institute of Technology presented a discussion of the use for Nanogrids within Net-Zero energy buildings. Dr. Boroyevich discussed Nanogrids that could be isolated from the grid but not necessarily be a DC voltage. They could be AC or DC. His theme was that every piece of equipment in the home now has a power electronic converter in it and those can be utilized to provide control that combined with renewable can achieve Net-Zero. He also stated this is not likely to happen in the next five years but certainly within 50 Years.

The presenting speakers and, on the left, Doug McIlvoy, workshop facilitator, gather for discussion after the workshop.

The PSMA is preparing a full report of the workshop that will include all the presentations and discussion for those PSMA members unable to attend this workshop. Look for it this summer.

Provided by Doug McIlvoy, Power Electronic Strategies, Workshop Moderator

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