Microgrids and Distributed Energy Resources: Planning, Design, and Operation
A special issue of Energies (ISSN 1996-1073). This special issue belongs to the section "A1: Smart Grids and Microgrids".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 10 February 2026 | Viewed by 25
Special Issue Editors
Interests: power system operation and planning; renewable energy; microgrids; distribution management system; demand response
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Driven by regulatory orders and customer expectations for efficient, economic, sustainable, reliable, and resilient electricity supply, microgrids and distributed energy resources (DERs) have been increasingly deployed worldwide, which brings unprecedented opportunities and challenges to the electric power systems, especially distribution grids. Microgrids provide a platform for the aggregation and optimization of mixed asset fleets of DERs, energy storage systems, electric vehicles (EVs), and controllable loads at the grid-edge to provide cost-efficient power supply with enhanced resilience and reliability. Nevertheless, these grid-edge asset fleets motivate the need for integrated models and tools for microgrid planning, design, and operations at increasing levels of complexity, ranging from the inclusion of control and stability of grid forming/following inverters to integration with other interdependent systems like thermal, natural gas, buildings, etc.
This Special Issue aims to present and disseminate the most recent advances related to the plan, design, and operation of microgrids (or aggregations of microgrids and DERs) for various needs and stakeholders (e.g., utilities, developers, aggregators, and campuses). In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome.
Topics of interest for this Special Issue include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Microgrid conceptual design and operation approaches and tools.
- Approaches that support microgrids to interact with utility management systems.
- Tools and approaches that support microgrids to provide flexibility and grid services.
- Tools and approaches that support microgrids to participate in energy and ancillary markets.
- Grid restoration and recovery considering microgrids and DERs.
- Grid reliability and resilience enhancement with microgrids and DERs.
- Tools and approaches that support aggregated design and operation of microgrids and DERs.
- Approaches for microgrid stability analysis.
- Tools and approaches that enable microgrids to interact with thermal, natural gas, water and building systems.
- Networked/nested microgrids.
- Hierarchical and distributed control of microgrids.
- Artificial intelligence (AI) supported decision making for microgrids.
Dr. Guodong Liu
Dr. Maximiliano F. Ferrari
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Energies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- microgrids and distributed energy resources (DERs)
- microgrid planning, operation, and control
- grid resilience and reliability
- market participation of microgrids
- optimization for microgrids and DERs
- modelling and simulation techniques for microgrids and DERs
- networked microgrid interactions and controllers
- regulatory and technoeconomic aspects of microgrids
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