Probabilistic Resilience of DER systems -- A Simulation Assisted Optimization Approach

Abstract: Energy systems resilience is becoming increasingly important as the frequency of major grid outages increases. In this work, we present a methodology to optimize a behind-the-meter distributed energy resource system to sustain a site's critical loads during a pre-defined utility outage period. With the fixed system design, we then propose an outage simulation approach to estimate the resilience potential of the DER system to sustain loads beyond the fixed outage period - a yearlong resilience performance analysis. We apply statistical analysis to assess the system's resilience performance over a broader parametric problem space on an hourly, monthly, and yearly basis. We present a case study to demonstrate the impact of the pre-defined outage period on the resilience performance of the system. The case study shows that the probability of surviving a random outage of a given duration changes from 20 percent to 95 percent when the outage is modeled for a weekday instead of a weekend for the case study building.