Technological Advancements for Large Scale Adoption of Smart-Inverters

The difficulty in maintaining dynamic power balance and the increased investment and operational costs to improve power quality and reliability are the main bottlenecks to achieving high penetration of renewable energy sources. Smart inverters are envisioned as the enabling technology for the reliable, sustainable, and cost-effective integration of renewable energy sources and energy storage into power systems. Smart inverters can provide support to maintain power quality and stability of the electric grid under a high penetration level of renewable energy. However, technological and economic roadblocks still slow down adoption of advanced control features in smart inverters. This panel session aims to discuss the main advancements of smart inverter design, control, and operation. In addition, this panel session addresses economic challenges in the way of providing services from smart inverters to power systems.