POWER November 2021 - 12

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for the quantum computing application.
Along with better battery development,
decentralized asset management could
benefit from large-scale optimization
from a better understanding of their dimensional
interplay on the grid, he said.
He also pointed to the potential development
of climate models that better
respond to renewable variability, and optimized
layouts for power generation assets,
and gas and heat networks.
" Quantum systems are especially
adequate to model graphs, and all the
[power and gas] networks that we have
end up being a graph structure, " he said.
" Graphs can be mapped into a quantum
computer and optimized nicely, " he said.
On the financial front, quantum systems
could optimize energy procurement,
trading, and hedging. That's especially important
for E.ON, which has divested its
large-scale generation sources and must
better anticipate prices and power demand,
Moreno said. But quantum systems could
also boost more effective power regulation
through better simulations and perhaps result
in more refined engineering to cater to
those regulations, he suggested.
Stephen Jordan, a principal researcher
at Microsoft Quantum, meanwhile, said
his company has explored quantum applications
to resolve the complex unit commitment
issue, which involves optimally
scheduling the startup and shutdown of
gas turbines and other generation units
to achieve energy supply and demand
matches at minimum fuel costs and minimum
carbon emissions. " This is a very
complicated optimization problem that's
been hard to solve " because the number
of production units can be large, and different
types of units have different cost
constraints, Jordan said. It's been studied
for many years, but conventional methods
struggle with it. " We've found that
methods that we have can parallelize very
nicely with these quantum-inspired optimization
methods. We can run in parallel
up to 50 times faster on the benchmark
instances that we've looked at compared
to the industry-standard solver for these
unit commitment problems, " he said.
Giani and Eldredge, in their paper, offer
an in-depth look at the possible quantum
approaches to power sector issues,
weighing their potential against challenges.
One approach that could benefit
from less-sophisticated hardware
(and which the researchers therefore
conclude may have a relatively " shortterm "
developmental timeline) includes
quantum annealing-algorithms that
" tunnel " into quantum processes to
12
find low-energy solutions to optimization
problems. The approach could be used
to resolve complex issues related to unit
commitment, maintenance scheduling,
resource planning, load scheduling, and
machine learning, they suggest. While
Giani and Eldredge caution that ongoing
work is exploratory and significant technical
challenges and uncertainties exist,
they conclude that " early research in unit
commitment and other power systems
problems on quantum devices is already
quite promising and showing potential
quantum advantage on small problems. "
Another interesting approach the researchers
highlight is Grover's algorithm,
a technique for finding items in a database
that could deliver a quantum " speedup "
equal to the square root of the size of
the database. " Although this search for
a marked item is not directly related to
power system reliability, Grover's algorithm
can be extended to perform other
types of search problems, " the researchers
note. " As an example, if a quantum
computer can be programmed to recognize
unsafe contingencies in power systems,
amplitude estimation algorithms
could be used to search through sets
of possible scenarios to identify which
events might lead to widespread blackouts
or other grid instabilities, " they said.
-Sonal Patel is a POWER senior
associate editor.
POWER Digest
Siemens' Turbine Set for New Greece
Gas-Fired Plant. Siemens Energy in
September announced it will supply its
HL-class gas turbine technology to Greece
for the first time, at a new combined cycle
power plant in Komotini in the northeast
of the country. Siemens said the plant,
with installed generation capacity of 877
MW, will be the world's most powerful
combined cycle power plant in 1x1 configuration.
Greece is looking for gas-fired
generation to help replace retiring coalfired
units, and provide more energy security
for the country, along with helping
decarbonize its energy sector, according
to government officials. Terna S.A. is
building the entire plant for the project
company Thermoilektriki Komotinis
M.A.E., which is owned in equal parts
by Motor Oil Renewable Energy and
GEK Terna. Commissioning of the plant
is scheduled for mid-2024. The new gasfired
facility is designed as a multi-shaft
plant, with one gas turbine and one steam
turbine each driving their own generator.
The Siemens Energy scope of supply
includes a power island consisting of an
www.powermag.com
SGT5-9000HL gas turbine, an SST5-5000
steam turbine, an SGen5-3000W generator
for the gas turbine, an SGen5-1200A
generator for the steam turbine, the heatrecovery
steam generator, and the SPPAT3000
control system.
Solar Plant Comes Online in South
Africa. The Greefspan II solar photovoltaic
power plant began commercial operation
in September. The 63.2-MW plant,
located in the Northern Cape province
of South Africa, is operated by GRS, a
subsidiary of the Gransolar Group. The
Northern Cape province is known for its
renewable energy projects; government
officials have said the Northern Cape has
more than five dozen renewable energy
projects online, including solar, wind, and
hydro installations. Greefspan II is backed
by fund manager African Infrastructure
Investment
Managers,
the
Spanish
company TSK, and Umbono Energy
Partners of South Africa. GRS said the
project created 700 jobs during construction.
The developers were awarded the
project in the fourth round of tenders under
the Renewable Energy Independent
Power Producer Procurement Program
(REIPPP), a public-private partnership
created by South Africa's government in
2011. The REIPPP is designed to attract
investment from independent power producers,
who then sell electricity to stateowned
utility Eskom.
Wärtsilä Developing Gas-Fired Plant
in Gabon. The technology group Wärtsilä
in late September announced it had an
agreement with Gabon Power Co. (GPC)
for construction, operation, and maintenance
of a new 120-MW gas-fired power
plant in that country. Wärtsilä said it would
jointly lead the project development with
GPC. Wärtsilä will build the plant under a
full engineering, procurement, and construction
contract, and will then operate
and maintain the plant under a 15-year operations
and maintenance (O&M) agreement.
The groups said they will finalize and
sign the development and O&M contracts,
under the auspices of Orinko S.A.-a joint
venture between Wärtsilä and GPC-next
year. The plant will be located at the industrial
site of Owendo, close to Libreville,
the country's capital. The plant when operational
will supply electricity to Société
d'Energie et d'Eau du Gabon (SEEG),
the Gabonese utility, under a 15-year
power purchase agreement. The project
represents one of the largest of its kind
in sub-Saharan Africa. " There is currently
a structural deficit between the supply
capability and the demand for electricity,
which is increasing year by year, " said MarPOWER
| November 2021
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POWER November 2021

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