Kody Merlin Powell

University of Utah | UOU · Department of Chemical Engineering

There has been a growing interest in Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs) in recent years due to the significant potential for increasing flexibility, security, and reliability of the grid, as well as the inherent passive safety features when compared to traditional pressurized water reactors (PWRs). MSRs can help meet many future nuclear energy goals, such...

With decreasing computational costs, improvement in algorithms, and the aggregation of large industrial and commercial datasets, machine learning is becoming a ubiquitous tool for process and business innovations. Machine learning is still lacking applications in the field of dynamic optimization for real-time control. This work presents a novel fr...

Customer-owned, distributed battery installations are being incentivized by utilities to increase installed battery capacity. In many of these incentive agreements, the battery owner relinquishes battery control to the utility in exchange for incentive money. The industrial sector has lagged in storage installation when compared to the residential...

There is an increasing need to reduce fossil fuel consumption used for industrial process heat to slow the effects of climate change. Using solar thermal heat is a viable way to replace fossil fuel use, but solar industrial process heat plants have limited implementation due to large upfront costs and inefficiencies from the inherent variability fr...

Although the world is shifting toward using more renewable energy resources, combustion systems will still play an important role in the immediate future of global energy. To follow a sustainable path to the future and reduce global warming impacts, it is important to improve the efficiency and performance of combustion processes and minimize their...

With increasing grid-penetration of renewable energy resources and a rising need for carbon-free dispatchable power generation, nuclear-hybrid energy systems (NHES), consisting of small modular reactors, are an increasingly attractive option for maintaining grid stability. NHES can accomplish this with a minimal carbon footprint but there are signi...

A study in optimal dispatch and economic analysis of a novel nuclear hybrid energy system (NHES) with large-scale hydrogen storage and a novel control scheme is conducted. The control scheme makes charge and discharge decisions by using the real-time electricity price relative to the historical price distribution. The pricing data is taken from the...

Three model configurations are presented for multi-step time series predictions of the heat absorbed by the water and steam in a thermal power plant. The models predict over horizons of 2, 4, and 6 steps into the future, where each step is a 5-minute increment. The evaluated models are a pure machine learning model, a novel hybrid machine learning...

The increasing fraction of intermittent renewable energy in the electrical grid is resulting in coal-fired boilers now routinely ramp up and down. The current state-of-the-art operation for such boilers is to apply steady-state, neural network-based optimization to make control decisions in real-time, and this work demonstrates the feasibility of e...

This study focuses on the modeling and simulation of a novel design and operation of a solar industrial process heat (SIPH) plant that uses a parabolic trough collector system for generating process heat. The SIPH plant incorporates flexible heat integration (FHI) by having two options for heat sinks as well as a flexible collection temperature for...

Fault detection plays an important role in identifying abnormalities in high-cost, large-scale industrial processes. Clustering in combination with dimensionality reduction is a common practice in data analysis and anomaly detection but is not well explored in the field of industrial fault detection. In this paper, we apply correlation clustering b...

Applications of dual-evaporator refrigeration systems have recently gained much attention both in academia and industry due to their multiple benefits. In this study, a comprehensive thermodynamic and economic analysis is conducted to evaluate the potential of using several environmentally friendly refrigerant couples and identifies the most suitab...

In this work, detailed techno-economic and environmental analyses are conducted for employing a 5 MWt parabolic trough-based solar industrial process heat (SIPH) plant in Salt Lake City, Utah. According to the results, an optimum solar multiple of 1.5 was determined, allowing the plant to generate annual thermal energy of 15389.24 MWth with a capac...

Manufacturing facilities with large electricity and steam loads commonly meet those loads with a grid and boiler (GB) system configuration. In this study, two alternatives, a natural gas turbine cycle driven combined heat and power (CHP) system configuration and a grid boiler system augmented with photovoltaics (GB-PV), are investigated sustainable...

A novel methodology to develop implicit hybrid models is presented. PyTorch is used to integrate physics-based equations with machine learning models. Automatic differentiation of the hybrid model is leveraged to solve the implicit equations. Iterative solving enables gradient based updates to the machine learning model. The novel methodology is co...

In this study, a nuclear hybrid energy system (NHES) with large-scale hydrogen storage integrated with a gas turbine cycle is proposed as a flexible system for load following. The proposed system consists of a nuclear reactor, a steam Rankine cycle, a hydrogen electrolyzer, a storage system for hydrogen in an underground salt cavern, and a Brayton...

As renewable energy technologies decrease in cost and become more prevalent, there is an increasing trend towards electrification of many energy systems [...]

Ten established, data-driven dynamic algorithms are surveyed and a practical guide for understanding these methods generated. Existing Python programming packages for implementing each algorithm are acknowledged, and the model equations necessary for prediction are presented. A case study on a coal-fired power plant’s NOx emission rates is performe...

Multigeneration systems represent an appealing concept, due to their multiple benefits compared to standalone systems, which has motivated researchers to develop different types of multigeneration systems for several applications. Considering their significance, in this study, a novel multigeneration is proposed that uses the waste heat of a thermo...

Scenario generations of cooling, heating, and power loads are of great significance for the economic operation and stability analysis of integrated energy systems. In this paper, a novel deep generative network is proposed to model cooling, heating, and power load curves based on generative moment matching networks (GMMN) where an auto-encoder tran...

This study investigates the technical and economic feasibility of using high levels of solar energy penetration up to 400 MW into a smart grid system of 60,000 smart houses. A novel non-cooperative Stackelberg game is introduced that incorporates the profitability of the supply-side and helps in solving problems related to over-generation and photo...

High concentration photovoltaic (HCPV) technologies offer several advantages over typical PV systems. In this study, a detailed economic assessment and sensitivity analysis of deploying HCPV plants in the US southwest is performed. To do this, a 20 MWdc HCPV power plant is designed using the System Advisor Model (SAM) and is evaluated from both tec...

Packed-bed thermal energy storage (TES) is a cost-effective storage option for high temperature applications. This study aims to accurately model the behavior of a packed-bed TES system during transient operation while maintaining low computation time. This is realized through the development of a novel 1D × 1D model accounting for intra-particle c...

One popular method for optimizing systems, referred to as ANN-PSO, uses an artificial neural network (ANN) to approximate the system and an optimization method like particle swarm optimization (PSO) to select inputs. However, with reinforcement learning developments, it is important to compare ANN-PSO to newer algorithms, like Proximal Policy Optim...

Hybridization of concentrated solar power (CSP) plants provides flexibility in operation that can drastically improve the solar-to-electric (STE) efficiency and levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) relative to standalone CSP plants. Flexible heat integration (FHI) is a novel concept where the collection and integration of CSP within a power plant i...

With the intermittency that comes with electricity generation from renewables, utilizing dynamic pricing will encourage the demand-side to respond in a smart way that would minimize the electricity costs and flatten the net electricity demand curve. Determining the optimal dynamic pricing profile that would leverage distributed storage to flatten t...

In this study, a novel triple power cycle is proposed where waste heat from a gas turbine cycle is utilized to drive a supercritical carbon dioxide (s-CO2) recompression cycle and a recuperative organic Rankine cycle (ORC) in sequence. A detailed thermoeconomic model is developed and implemented in MATLAB to evaluate the performance of the proposed...

Ozone (O3) is a potent oxidant associated with adverse health effects. Low-cost O3 sensors, such as metal oxide (MO) sensors, can complement regulatory O3 measurements and enhance the spatiotemporal resolution of measurements. However, the quality of MO sensor data remains a challenge. The University of Utah has a network of low-cost air quality se...

This work introduces a novel methodology for real-time optimization (RTO) of process systems using reinforcement learning (RL), where optimal decisions in response to external stimuli become embedded into a neural network. This is in contrast to the conventional RTO methodology, where a process model is solved repeatedly for optimality. This reinfo...

The direct steam generator (DSG) solar power tower plant concept is receiving more attention due to its ability to provide superheated steam without any intermediate heat exchanger and heat transfer fluid. However, the literature on the time-dependent or quasi-static performance evaluation of these systems is limited. In this study, a thermoeconomi...

Depending on the application and demands, different products can be generated utilizing multigeneration systems. To drive such systems, solar energy can be used as a primary energy source or in hybridization with other renewable or nonrenewable energy sources. Solar driven multigeneration systems are appealing due to the broad availability of solar...

In this study, two novel hybrid solar power tower-gas turbine combined power cycles are proposed, in which two supercritical CO2 (s-CO2) power cycles connected in series are driven by waste energy from a gas turbine cycle partially driven by a solar power tower. The solar power tower system provides a high-temperature thermal energy up to 1223 K. E...

A nonlinear support vector machine (SVM) uses engineered features to classify the quality of currently combusting coal as it is fired in an operating electric utility generator. The SVM classification result selects a unique neural network regression model to predict NOx emission rate. A two-part exhaustive grid-search and 5-fold cross-validation r...

Existing electrical generating stations must operate with greater flexibility due to increasing renewable energy penetration on the electrical grid, and many coal-fired power stations have transitioned away from baseload operation to load-following operation to aid in grid stability. In cases where multiple independently controlled cooling tower ce...

In this study, detailed thermo-economic analysis and parametric studies are conducted to evaluate the performance of a hybrid triple effect parallel flow water-lithium bromide (H2O-LiBr) absorption-compression cycle, that integrates a compressor between the evaporator and absorber. Optimization using a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is...

Combined heat and power (CHP) is an electricity generation strategy that benefits all sides with a vested interest in the nations’ energy future. The technology allows for the efficient production of electricity and heat, which in turn reduces the carbon footprint and energy costs of a facility with significant heat and electricity loads. This pape...

The objective of this study is to develop and thoroughly evaluate several feasible hybrid trigeneration configurations based on a gas turbine combined cycle (GTCC) for generating electricity, freshwater, and cooling. Six hybrid configurations are developed by integrating different desalination and chiller systems to the GTCC. Desalination systems i...

The evolution of the electrical grid requires flexibility in electricity consumption. Given the tremendous amount of electricity consumed by mineral processing, these facilities could become a grid asset if they can leverage sources of flexibility. Shifting facility electricity consumption to limit demand and be predictable is valuable for grid man...

This work explores the development of a home energy management system (HEMS) that uses weather and market forecasts to optimize the usage of home appliances and to manage battery usage and solar power production. A Moving Horizon Estimation (MHE) application is used to find the unknown home model parameters. These parameters are then updated in a M...

Rotary kilns require large fans to induce drafts to support transformation of minerals. If fan controls can be modified to respond to rapid changes in electric demand, they can become valuable grid assets. Due to their considerable thermal inertia, kilns and the associated fans are traditionally operated continuously in a steady manner to avoid pro...

Meeting increasingly stringent environmental targets while conforming to new operational demands of load-ramping and low-load operation presents a challenge for coal-fired thermal power stations. Artificial neural networks (ANNs) have been shown to predict efficiency and emissions of power stations, however, existing literature is comprised of offl...

With exposure to real-time market pricing structures, consumers would be incentivized to invest in electrical energy storage systems and smart predictive automation of their home energy systems. Smart home automation through optimizing HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) temperature set points, along with distributed energy storage, c...

The addition of thermal energy storage and natural gas as a complementary energy source improves the flexibility, reliability, and value of concentrated solar power (CSP) plants. Nevertheless, due to the transient nature of solar energy, transitions from solar-only mode and natural-gas mode to hybrid solar-natural gas mode is quite challenging, esp...

Hybridization of concentrated solar power (CSP) with other energy sources can drastically increase how much solar energy is harnessed and potentially expand the current geographical deployment of CSP installlations. In this study, a novel operation strategy referred to as flexible heat integration (FHI), is proposed and applied to a hybrid CSP-natu...

Carbon dioxide vapor compression refrigeration cycles operating at low evaporator temperatures represent a substantial waste energy recovery potential to generate useful products using the high-temperature carbon dioxide leaving the compressor. Despite this remarkable potential, there are limited investigations about waste energy recovery from thes...

Desalination market is experiencing continuous growth due to severe water scarcity in many parts of the globe. Because of the geographical coincidence of serious water scarcity and substantial direct normal irradiation potential, concentrated solar power (CSP) driven desalination presents a potential means to tackle water scarcity. Since CSPs can g...

Multigeneration systems provide substantial benefits in terms of improving efficiency and economics as well as environmental benefits. In this study, a multigeneration system is proposed for generating power and triple effect refrigeration at different evaporation temperatures. The system hybridizes a 25 MW recuperative Brayton cycle with an organi...

A dynamic model of a tower-driven, hybrid solar gas turbine power plant is presented to highlight the benefits of hybrid operation as well as the development a novel plant configuration to improve solar fraction by leveraging a packed-bed thermal energy storage (TES). Relative to solar-only plant, hybridisation increases solar-to-electric efficienc...

Demand side management of energy is a vital function in the smart grid that allows for greater integration of renewable energy resources, and is facilitated with economic incentives in energy and demand pricing schedules. Manufacturing systems can take advantage of these incentives to reduce their energy costs through active energy management. This...

In the opinion of these authors, technology alone can never give an organization an edge over competitors or provide an industry step change. However, history has shown that technology applied with correct logistics and strategy makes a significant difference. Never has the minerals industry faced such daunting challenges and been in such need of a...

As more renewable energy is integrated into the power grid, it is increasingly important to exploit variable electricity pricing structures to minimize commercial utility costs and enable more intermittent renewables on the grid through proactive management of energy storage. Using data from a large campus district energy system, equipped with cent...

The applications of multi-evaporator and low temperature refrigeration systems are growing rapidly, highlighting the necessity of developing new configurations that can be economically and environmentally attractive. In this study, a hybrid dual-evaporator absorption refrigeration system for refrigerating and freezing applications is proposed and e...

The concept of process intensification involves any improvement in the process or equipment that leads to reduced cost and emissions, increased efficiency, or improved productivity. This paper proposes a novel dynamic process intensification approach that results in similar benefits as the traditional process intensification. The proposed approach...

The inception of the Western Energy Imbalance Market (EIM) in November of 2014 has had significant impacts on participating balancing authorities (BAs) and individual generators. The EIM serves to balance available energy across a large geographical footprint. Since the market's creation, the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) has repor...

Stabilizing the effects of greenhouse gases emissions on the atmosphere is a key step towards solving the global climate change problem. The power industry is one of the major sectors for greenhouse gas emissions. One solution to help reduce emissions from the existing power plants is to hybridize them with renewable energy sources. Solar energy is...

This work demonstrates process intensification of a solar thermal and natural gas hybrid power plant. Process intensification is achieved in three novel ways: 1- By synergistically designing the plant, the efficiency at which solar power is collected is dramatically improved. The plant uses a parabolic trough solar collector and combines it with na...

Increasing penetration of renewable energy sources to the power grid has prompted new ramping scenarios to dispatchable thermal power plants to balance the variability caused by intermittent renewable supplies. With many thermal power plants designed to be base-loaded, ramping of the power output results in increased emission of pollutants. This st...

Power utilities currently manage unpredictable electrical demand through the use of fast-ramping plants and punitive demand fees. Unpredictable demand makes it more difficult to onboard variable renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind, because of their intermittency, which can contribute to grid instability. Optimal utilization of variable...

While Photovoltaics have become more cost-effective for homeowners, utilities still have to manage the uncertainty and variability that comes with it. This paper explores the use of photovoltaic and battery storage for homeowners under different utility rates by adding a proactive energy management system to optimize battery usage. Results show tha...

With computer technology improving exponentially, data will grow incomprehensibly in size, complexity, and noise. However, latent within the data, valuable signals are hidden that, if discovered, can offer abundant information, such as fault detection. Traditionally, principal component analysis has been used to perform fault detection in large, mu...

A method is presented to enhance solar penetration of a hybrid solar-combined cycle power plant integrated with a packed-bed thermal energy storage system. The hybrid plant is modeled using Simulink and employs systems-level automation. Feedback control regulates net power, collector temperature, and turbine firing temperature. A base-case plant is...

General Session. WB46. Optimal Design and Dispatch of Alternative Energy Systems http://www.abstractsonline.com/pp8/#!/4701/presentation/3220

Current projections to the year 2050 reveal that fossil fuels will remain the main source of energy generation. To achieve the target limits of carbon dioxide emission, set by national and international policies, carbon capture will play a key role. Modeling and optimization of various carbon capture technologies such as pre-combustion, oxy-fuel, a...

This paper investigates potential cost savings in operating residential houses air-conditioning systems through dynamic real-time optimization (D-RTO). Standard design data collected from BEopt (Building Energy Optimization) software were used in Matlab/Simulink to simulate cooling energy consumption of a house model in Salt Lake City, Utah. Two di...

Concentrated solar power (CSP), or solar thermal power, is an ideal technology to hybridize with other energy technologies for power generation. CSP shares technology with conventional power generation and can be readily integrated with other energy types into a synergistic system, which has many potential benefits including increased dispatchabili...

This work presents a detailed case study for the optimization of the expansion of a district energy system evaluating the investment decision timing, type of capacity expansion, and fine-scale operational modes. The study develops an optimization framework to find the investment schedule over 30 years with options of investing in traditional heatin...

District energy systems can produce low-cost utilities for large energy networks, but can also be a resource for the electric grid by their ability to ramp production or to store thermal energy by responding to real-time market signals. In this work, dynamic optimization exploits the flexibility of thermal energy storage by determining optimal time...

This work presents a methodology to represent logical decisions in differential algebraic equation simulation and constrained optimization problems using a set of continuous algebraic equations. The formulations may be used when state variables trigger a change in process dynamics, and introduces a pseudo-binary decision variable, which is continuo...

Thermal energy storage (TES) is a cost-effective technology that can greatly improve the performance of energy systems that have dynamic supply or demand. In solar thermal systems, TES plus controls enables the power output of the plant to be intensified and effectively regulated, despite fluctuating solar irradiance. In district energy systems, TE...

This paper describes nonlinear methods in model building, dynamic data reconciliation, and dynamic optimization that are inspired by researchers and motivated by industrial applications. A new formulation of the ℓ1-norm objective with a dead-band for estimation and control is presented. The dead-band in the objective is desirable for noise rejectio...

This work illustrates the synergy that exists between solar thermal and fossil fuel energy systems. By adding degrees of freedom and optimizing the system, more solar energy can be harvested by operating in a “hybrid” mode, where a portion of the demand is met by solar energy, with the remainder provided by a supplemental fuel, such as natural gas....

Turbine inlet cooling (TIC) is a common technology used to increase combustion turbine power output and efficiency. The use of mechanical or absorption chillers for TIC allows for more air cooling than evaporative methods and also imposes a significant parasitic load to the turbine. Thermal energy storage (TES) can be used to shift this load to off...

This paper presents a study based on real plant data collected from chiller plants at the University of Texas at Austin. It highlights the advantages of operating the cooling processes based on an optimal strategy. A multi-component model is developed for the entire cooling process network. The model is used to formulate and solve a multi-period op...

Energy efficiency is receiving increased attention as a way to reduce the use of fossil fuels and the resulting production of greenhouse gases. Automation, process control, and real-time optimization are key technologies to operate plants in the most efficient way. A combined heat and power plant at the University of Texas at Austin has been studie...

This paper presents a study based on real plant data collected from chiller plants at the University of Texas at Austin. It highlights the advantages of operating the cooling processes based on an optimal strategy. A multi-component model is developed for the entire cooling process network. The model is used to formulate and solve a multi-period op...

Thermal energy storage gives a system enhanced operational flexibility because thermal loads can be shifted, not only spatially-from one piece of equipment to another-but also temporally, using storage, from one point in time to another. The resulting optimization problems become non-convex and difficult to solve. This paper illustrates how to take...