IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - September/October 2014 - 88

book review

sustainable electricity
a look at the green Azores islands

One bOOk is reviewed in this
issue, which looks at the energy sustainability in the Azores. the mission
of the book, according to the reviewers,
"is to make the electric energy systems
of two islands-Flores and são Miguel
in Azores archipelago, Portugal-as
green as possible without increasing the
long-term service cost."

Engineering IT-Enabled
Sustainable Electricity
Services: The Tale of Two
Low-Cost Green Azores
Islands
Marija Ilic´, Le Xie, and Qixing Liu,
editors
As the primary energy source, coal is
widely used for power generation, which
causes serious concerns related to the
environment and sustainability. thus, renewable energy sources have been developed significantly over the past decade.
Unfortunately, renewable energy tends
to be variable and uncertain because of
the prime movers (i.e., wind and solar)
and the dependence on natural and meteorological conditions. the motivation
of the book, Engineering IT-Enabled
Sustainable Electricity Services: The
Tale of Two Low-Cost Green Azores Islands, published by springer in 2013,
is to make the electric energy systems
of two islands-Flores and são Miguel
in the Azores archipelago, Portugal-
as green as possible without increasing
the long-term service cost. based on the

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPE.2014.2329171
Date of publication: 18 August 2014

ieee power & energy magazine

study of the electrical network, energy
resources, and demand characteristics of
the Azores islands, especially Flores and
são Miguel, a systematic deployment of
an it-enabled method and automation is
proposed to transform their current electric energy systems into sustainable, lowcost systems. there are at least six major
strengths in this book.
✔ real-world data are used in the
simulation and study, which is an
excellent resource for those who
are interested in gaining more
thorough research in developing a
stronger, cleaner, and more
intelligent
electric energy
infrastructure.
based on the
book, Flores is
one of the smallest islands of
the Azores archipelago, with
a population of
about 4,000 inhabitants. the
island is powered by a fleet
of diesel generators, a reservoir hydro plant,
and synchronous wind turbinegenerators. são Miguel island is
the capital and the largest island
with 140,000 inhabitants, powered by geothermal, hydropower,
and heavy fuel oil. As for the
wind data in the Azores archipelago, the missing data is corrected
and the wind turbine hub height is

derived based on the raw meteorological wind speed data. then,
the wind turbine manufacturer's
data sheets are used to convert
wind speed to wind power.
✔ Look-ahead dispatch for the efficient use of available resources is
proposed for wind and load power
prediction for the islands of Flores
and são Miguel. due to the presence of major new uncertainties in
power systems (e.g., high penetration of variable generation and responsive loads), the operation and
planning of electric
power systems have
become more challenging than in the
past. in this book, lookahead generation dispatch is subject to ramp
constraints with wind
power and load forecasts. the proposed
model can obtain the
dispatch of less expensive and less polluting
generation. to design
the right demand response program for the
islands, the ability of
different types of loads to participate in adaptive load management
is assessed. For instance, since
there are many automobiles in
Flores, electric vehicles can be used
to adjust their energy needs to support high penetrations of wind and
solar power.
✔ the recommendations for minimizing power delivery losses
september/october 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - September/October 2014