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This transition of DNOs to DSOs in the next few years will
certainly bring exciting new regulatory environments where the
envisioned smart grids are likely to finally emerge.
central to how the project appraises the potential future development of DSO landscape are scenarios, roles, and services.
✔ Scenario: Within the evolvDSO project, a scenario is
a specific context explicitly defined for each country
under consideration, delineating the scope of conceivable future developments in, for instance, load growth,
renewables development, or uptake of EVs.
✔ Roles: An outward-facing function performed by a DSO.
✔ Services: A general function that a DSO implements
to fulfil one of its specific roles.
Though the notion of a service is connected with a specific
technical functionality, and therefore a tool, the software tools
themselves are not services but rather facilitators of services.
Inevitably, all aspects of the distribution business will be
affected by the exciting changes underway across the energy
landscape, and the evolvDSO project is steering a steady
course into this uncertain future. Using the above framework,
the project has examined many aspects of a DNO's activities,
such as planning, operational scheduling, real-time operations,
maintenance, and asset management. (See Figure 8). By projecting how potential new scenarios could transform a DNO's
fundamental roles and attendant services, a series of use cases
were collaboratively drawn up. These use-case documents systematically defined the new computational functionalities that
would be required for DNOs to excel in their emerging roles.
These use cases became the basis for the novel software tools
that were developed as the second phase of project. In total, ten
new software tools were written, with each focusing on some
changing aspect of how DNOs perform their role in society.
The evolvDSO project does not restrict itself to developing notional software tools. Its goal is proposing real solution
to pressing problems, and it is entirely fitting that these solutions would be tested on real networks. To that end, demonstrations of the developed tools are now successfully underway
across the continent. For instance, the Portuguese research
group INESC is testing the smart power-flow tools developed
on Energias de Portugal's INOVGRID test site in Portugal as
well as on Électricité Réseau Distribution France's (ERDF's)
SOGRID test site in France. The Italian DNO, Enel, is testing its new network reliability training tool within the Milano
Centro Prove facility. University College Dublin is testing the
advancement asset management tool among Electricity Supply
Board Network's asset planners. Finally, RSE is demonstrating its contingency simulation tool on ERDF's VENTEEA test
site. This applied aspect of the evolvDSO project again highlights the benefit of bringing together research and industry
players in one international consortium.
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Conclusions
The challenge for EU member states is to ensure the timely
evolution of DNOs to their future, more active roles, which are
necessary to make low-carbon societies a reality. While the corresponding regulatory actions will largely depend on the context and characteristics of the distribution networks within each
member state, it is clear that incentivizing innovation should
be key in this endeavor. Equally critical is defining the roles
of potential future players and technologies in the provision of
flexibility (e.g., consumers, aggregators, and storage) to prevent
new business models being hindered by regulatory barriers.
This transition of DNOs to DSOs in the next few years will
certainly bring exciting new regulatory environments where the
envisioned smart grids are likely to finally emerge.

For Further Reading
THINK Project, "From distribution networks to smart distribution systems: Rethinking the regulation of European
electricity DSOs," topic 12, Final Rep., June 2013.
Council of European Energy Regulators, "The future role
of DSOs-A CEER conclusion paper," Brussels, Belgium,
Tech. Rep. C15-DSO-16-03, July 2015.
Office of Gas and Electricity Markets,"Making the electricity system more flexible and delivering the benefits for
consumers," London, U.K., Sept. 2015.
Joint Research Centre. (2016). Survey for the collection of
European smart grid projects. [Online]. Available: http://ses.jrc.
ec.europa.eu/survey-collection-european-smart-grid-projects
M. Coppo, P. Pelacchi, F. Pilo, G. Pisano, G. G. Soma,
and R. Turri, "The Italian smart grid pilot projects: Selection
and assessment of the test beds for the regulation of smart
electricity distribution," Electric Power Syst. Res., vol. 120,
pp. 136-149, Mar. 2015.
evolvDSO Project. (2016). Development of methodologies and tools for new and evolving DSO roles for efficient
DRES integration in distribution network [Online]. Available: http://www.evolvdso.eu/

Biographies
Luis (Nando) Ochoa is with the University of Melbourne, Australia, and the University of Manchester, United Kingdom.
Fabrizio Pilo is with the University of Cagliari, Italy.
Andrew Keane is with University College Dublin, Ireland.
Paul Cuffe is with University College Dublin, Ireland.
Giuditta Pisano is with the University of Cagliari, Italy.
p&e
september/october 2016

http://www.ses.jrc http://ec.europa.eu/survey http://www.evolvdso.eu/

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - September/October 2016