Emerging Trend in Power Generation and Utilization

Abstract

Power generation technology has been evolving ever since Edison put up his first generating station. It started with generation near the load center. To capitalize on the economics of scale large power plants were set up near the energy centers like the coal mine heads. This led to development of long distance transmission lines and the grids. Then came the restructuring of the rules and regulations governing the power system. With the issues of pollution and Global warming coming to the fore a paradigm shift is noticed in the generation of electrical power. Large number of renewable energy sources (RES) based small generators started getting connected to the distribution system. The concept of microgrid evolved to control and regulate the RES based generations. In order to effectively use these RES based generation and to capitalize from the electrical energy trading the concept of Virtual Power Plant and Community microgrid have started taking shape.