Anatomy of an organizational change effort at the Lewis Research Center

By 1979, after a long decline following the end of the Apollo program, the Lewis Research Center found its very existence endangered because it was not doing the kind of research that could attract funding at the time. New management under Andrew J. Stofan applied a program of strategic planning, participative management, and consensus decision making. A corporate-cultural change was effected which enabled Lewis to commit itself to four fundable research and development projects. Morale-building and training programs which were essential to this change are described

The impact of maintenance contract arrangements on the yield of offshore wind power plants

In the optimisation of maintenance and vessel strategies for the operation of offshore wind plant, it is normally assumed that the off-taker of the power produced may directly control the dispatch of maintenance resources. However, in practice, services such as maintenance technicians and vessels are usually contracted from companies with larger arenas of operation, and so the organisational interfaces between these parties, and the different objective functions involved, need to be considered. This article looks at different current and future models for contracted maintenance, identifies interfaces and conflicts of interest, and constructs a quantified model demonstrating the potential impact on headline energy yields for a set of wind farms with a common contracted maintenance resource. The modelling illustrates that the performance of a site with contracted maintenance operations is not only dependent on the contracts held by that site but also on the effective competition in place with other sites for a centralised resource, and the performance of a site may be highly sensitive to the alignment of contractual incentives, relative travel distances, and the relative size of the site in terms of energy yield

Managing regional security of supply : a case study from Scotland

Securing the supply of electricity to a region of a power system requires either generation capacity within that region, or transmission import capability coupled with generation elsewhere in the power system. The problem is one of co-optimising generation and transmission infrastructure. This paper begins by discussing changes in Great Britain (GB) regulator environment affecting the provision of regional security of supply: changes to the transmission charging regime; new regulatory arrangements including enhancements to the System Operator’s role, and the opening up of major new transmission projects to competition; and some limitations of the existing standard defining the methodology for calculating secure transmission capabilities. Scotland, as a region of the GB power system, provides an interesting case study in which to investigate the allocation of contributions to regional security of supply between transmission and various categories of generation. In particular, intermittent generation is currently ignored when calculating the level of transmission import capability required to maintain security of supply in a region, whilst it is considered in overall generation adequacy calculations at a system level. Whilst wind generation is not dispatchable, it is shown here that it does provide an additional source of generation availability that should be considered in studies into transmission import requirements. This paper uses historical data for Scottish generation availability from recent winters to investigate the likely impact of changes to the Scottish generation fleet on the need for secure transmission import capability into Scotland. It calculates transmission requirements based on the risk of requiring demand reduction within a region. Scenarios representing possible generation backgrounds in Scotland over the coming decade show that, measured in this way, wind generation can offset transmission import requirements by up to 25% of its installed capacity. The key conclusions of the paper are that a risk-based analysis of regional security of supply and transmission requirements can help allocate the true impact of different generators on the transmission import capability needed to secure supply to a region. Such a method can therefore be useful in informing the allocation of charges between parties and in developing planning standards to shape future investment in the system

Capacity markets and the EU target model – a Great Britain case study

The growth of interconnection between national electricity markets is key to the development and competitive efficiency of the Single EU Market for Electricity. However, in parallel with the development of the Single Market, a growing number of EU Member States have implemented – or are in the process of developing – national Capacity Mechanisms in order to ensure future security of supply, which may distort the cross-border trade of energy across interconnectors and reduce total welfare. In particular, the Electricity Market Reform (EMR) legislative package recently brought in by the UK government introduced a Capacity Market (in which two rounds of auctions have taken place to date) for the provision of generation capacity from 2018. In order to ensure that such national markets do not distort the wider energy market, it is important that the role of cross-border capacity, and the availability of interconnector capacity, is correctly consolidated into such mechanisms. In the first annual GB auction the net contribution of interconnection was included on a conservative basis informed by historical data, and while interconnectors have since been permitted to bid into the Capacity Market at a de-rated value (in a similar manner to domestic generation), generators in other markets are still not able to explicitly participate. This may continue to introduce market distortions and adversely impact both short-term dispatch and long-term investment decisions in both the GB and neighbouring markets. A number of routes are available to resolve this through a mechanism to permit cross-border participation of generators, but this requires resolution of a number of complicating factors, not least a means for properly allocating transmission capacity without introducing further distortions to the energy market. Alternative solutions could be enacted at an EU-level, such as through the alignment of Capacity Mechanisms to a common model, or the introduction of an EU-wide single Capacity Mechanism, but the current regulatory focus appears to remain on resolution of such issues at a national level

Synthesis of wind time series for network adequacy assessment

When representing the stochastic characteristics of wind generators within power system simulations, the spatial and temporal correlations of the wind resource must be correctly modelled to ensure that reserve and network capacity requirements are not underestimated. A methodology for capturing these correlations within a vector auto-regressive (VAR) model is presented, and applied to a large-scale reanalysis dataset of historical wind speed data for the British Isles. This is combined with a wind speed-to-power conversion model trained against historically metered data from wind farms on the Great Britain (GB) electricity system in order to derive a lightweight model for simulating injections of wind power across a transmission network. The model is demonstrated to adequately represent ramp rates, both at a site and network level, as well as the individual correlations between sites, while being suitable for network adequacy studies which may require the simulation of many years of operation

Advancing the time of ripeness of grapes by the application of methyl 2-(ureidooxy) propionate (a growth retardant)

Methyl 2-(ureidooxy) propionate (MUP), a plant growth retardant, hastened the ripening of grape berries of Vitis vinifera L. cultivars Mataro and Sultana by about 2 weeks and 1 week, respectively. The vines were sprayed with 0.1 % solution of MUP about halfway :through the first rapid growth phase of the fruit and again 2 weeks later. Terminal and lateral shoot growth was inhibited. Ripening of berries was advanced as measured by development of colour, and changes in titratable acid and reducing sugar content. The earlier ripening of the berries may have been due to hormonal changes but the advancement was much greater than that found previously with abscisic acid or ethylene applied during the slow growth stage of berry development.Die Beschleunigung des Reifezeitpunktes von Trauben durch die Anwendung vonMethyl-2-(ureidooxy)-Propionat, einen WachstumsdämpferMethyl-2-(ureidooxy)-Propionat (MUP), welches das Pflanzenwachstum verlangsamt, beschleunigte bei den Vitis-vinifera-Sorten Mataro und Sultana die Beerenreife um etwa 2 Wochen bzw. 1 Woche. Die Reben wurden etwa in der Mitte der ersten raschen Wachstumsphase der Beeren und ein weiteres Mal 2 Wochen später mit einer 0,1%igen MUP-Lösung besprüht. Das terminale und laterale Triebwachstum war gehemmt. Die Beerenreife war beschleunigt, wie die Entwicklung der Beerenfarbe und die Veränderungen im Gehalt an titrierbarer Säure und reduzierenden Zuckern zeigten. Die frühzeitigere Beerenreife könnte auf hormonale Veränderungen zurückgehen; allerdings war die Reife viel stärker beschleunigt als im Fall früherer Versuche, in denen während der langen Wachstumsphase der Beerenentwicklung Abscisinsäure oder Äthylen angewandt worden waren

A simple method for demonstrating macroscopically the location of polyphenolic compounds in grape berries

Slices of berries of several varieties of Vitis vinifera were stained with HCl, vanillin-HCl or FeCl3 to demonstrate macroscopically that the bulk of the polyphenolic compounds occur in the skins, seeds and conducting tissue of grape berries at all stages of development.Eine einfache Methode zur makroskopischen Lokalisation polyphenolischer Verbindungen in WeinbeerenSchnitte von Beeren verschiedener Vitis vinifera-Sorten wurden mit HCl, Vanillin-HCl oder FeCl3 angefärbt, um makroskopisch zu zeigen, daß der Hauptanteil der polyphenolischen Verbindungen in allen Entwicklungsphasen in der Schale, den Samen und den Leitbündeln der Weinbeere lokalisiert ist

Predicting the influence of a p2-symmetric substrate on molecular self-organization with an interaction-site model

An interaction-site model can a priori predict molecular selforganisation on a new substrate in Monte Carlo simulations. This is experimentally confirmed with scanning tunnelling microscopy on Fre´chet dendrons of a pentacontane template. Local and global ordering motifs, inclusion molecules and a rotated unit cell are correctly predicted

Adequacy assessment of future electricity networks

Liberalisation of electricity markets, changing patterns in the generation and use of electricity and new technologies are some of the factors that result in increased uncertainty about the future operating conditions of our power system. In this context, planning for future investments in power system requires careful selection and assessment of future operating conditions. This paper revisits the notion of power system adequacy and highlights the need for consideration of some factors that have hitherto tended not to be part of a transmission expansion planning process, in particular in respect of the credible range of possible values of system operating conditions and transitions between successive operating states. Firstly, we present some definitions of power system operational regions. Secondly, we present a stochastic optimisation model that measures the adequacy of a transmission network for given future operating conditions. Uncertainties in demand and generation are modelled using a large number of scenarios. The optimisation model identifies the critical future operating conditions needing the special attention of a power system planner. The proposed model is simulated on a 39-bus network, whereby it is shown that this model can identify critical operating conditions that need the attention of a system planner