Webinar: Effective Congestion Mitigation with Transmission Topology Optimization at Alliant Energy

Featured Speakers: Mitchell Myhre, Senior Manager of Business Planning and Regulatory Strategy, Alliant Energy; Abubaker Elteriefi, Manager of Operational Planning, ITC; Pablo A. Ruiz, Co-founder and CEO of NewGrid, Senior Consultant at The Brattle Group, Associate Research Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Boston University
Webinar Abstract: Timely and effective management of transmission system limitations has become critical to support the ongoing energy transition as well as economic development. Additional transmission capability is needed quickly to support increased deployment of variable energy resources, which often are located away from demand centers, the electrification of traditionally fossil energy uses, and other load growth, such as data centers.
Transmission congestion can become acute in many regions, and has imposed over $20 billion of added costs on US transmission customers in 2022. In also impacts grid reliability and resilience throughout the country. To cost-effectively manage transmission constraints will require improved congestion management practices and technologies to better utilize the existing grid, especially as new transmission facilities are planned and constructed.
Transmission topology optimization identifies grid reconfiguration options to quickly re-route power flow around bottlenecks, increasing transfer capability across congested areas. These reconfiguration solutions reduce the market redispatch and generation curtailments otherwise necessary to manage congestion and, by doing so, provide operational, efficiency, reliability, and resilience benefits.
In collaboration with NewGrid and ITC, Alliant Energy has been able to advance regionally beneficial and reliable reconfiguration opportunities to mitigate major congestion bottlenecks in the area. Working with the Midcontinent ISO, ITC and other Transmission Operators in the region to evaluate and leverage these opportunities, Alliant’s Interstate Power and Light customers have saved close to 50% of their net congestion costs in the last three years, in addition to avoiding curtailments of renewable resources. This webinar will review the Alliant Energy and ITC experience with the use of topology optimization, including case studies, key findings and recommendations.