Thousands of distribution grids worldwide are in urgent need of modernization to accommodate growing shares of renewable energy sources (RES) and changing patterns of generation and consumption.

However, the much needed investments are hampered by the growing complexity and multiple uncertainties facing key actor groups with responsibilities for grid development and operation.

As a major milestone, policymakers have a key role to play by creating favorable framework conditions for agile and forward-looking planning processes, thus de-risking and accelerating investments.

The Policy Brief argues for increased policy attention towards low- and medium-voltage grids and their key role in clean energy transitions.

ISGAN also encourages changing the planning practices of  Distribution System Operators/ Utilities: from reactive to forward-looking, adaptive and collaborative long-term planning, to better handle new complex realities.

This Policy Brief is a key deliverable of the ISGAN Lighthouse Project on Smart Distribution Grids.

Read more about the project:

ISGAN Launches New Policy Brief at CEM15 in Brazil

Global workshop series: Lighthouse experts explore distribution grid transformation worldwide

Next step of Lighthouse Project: Experts structure collected content

Survey: Opportunity to contribute to the knowledge co-creation of the ISGAN Lighthouse Project on Smart Distribution Grids

Co-creating Insights on Planning and Implementation of Smart Distribution Grids for the Future

ISGAN Lighthouse Project Workshop Welcomes Keynote Speakers from UNICEF

New takeaways from ISGAN Lighthouse Project

ISGAN Lighthouse Project: Illuminating Pathways for Smart Grid Development

Key highlights of the report include detailed insights into the activities and events conducted by each of the working groups. Among the flagship initiatives is ISGAN’s lighthouse project, “Electricity Network Planning and Implementation under Uncertainty for the Clean Energy Transition,” which focuses on strategic planning for intelligent distribution grids.

The report also reports significant events such as the ISGAN ExCo25 meeting in Berlin, Germany, and the ExCo26 meeting in Utrecht, the Netherlands, along with other key events such as the ISGAN Award and the CEM 14/MI-8 meeting in Goa, India. Additionally, it provides a summary of the ISGAN virtual learning webinars hosted in 2023 and includes a comprehensive list of publications released during the year.

This initiative aimed to collate global insights on challenges and solutions in grid planning, ensuring that power grids can effectively contribute to the SDGs. The project involved researchers, policy makers and representatives from both transmission and distribution system operators and the focal question encapsulated the overarching objective: How can power grids be strategically developed to align with, and contribute to the global sustainable development goals?

The project explored diverse long-term considerations in grid planning, addressing effective management of inherent uncertainty and complexity, the co-evolution of regulatory frameworks, workforce development, and heightened stakeholder coordination throughout the planning process. This report provides a detailed account of the collaborative process, the methodologies applied, and the outcomes achieved at each stage, with focus on explaining the meaning and context surrounding the synthesized policy messages that was the main outcome of the project.

The EU regulation has identified the independent aggregator, who is not affiliated to the customer’s supplier. However, the independent aggregator has not been fully implemented yet. There are existing aggregator services, but the challenges arise on how to accommodate diverse solutions from aggregator to support TSO-DSO coordination and enhance active customer participation.

This work investigated how aggregators can improve the TSO-DSO-Customer coordination in a digitalised power system by analysing existing policies, their role, possible coordination approaches, and addressing (non-) technical challenges.

FlexPlan created a new innovative grid-planning tool whose ambition is to go beyond the state of the art of planning methodologies by including the following innovative features:

• assessment of the best planning strategy by analysing in one shot a high number of candidate expansion options provided by a pre-processor tool,
• simultaneous mid- and long-term planning assessment over three grid years (2030, 2040, 2050),
• incorporation of a full range of cost–benefit analysis criteria into the target function,
• integrated transmission and distribution planning,
• embedded environmental analysis (air quality, carbon footprint, landscape constraints),
• probabilistic contingency methodologies in replacement of the traditional N-1 criterion,
• application of numerical decomposition techniques to reduce calculation efforts,
• analysis of variability of yearly renewable energy sources (RES) and load time series through a stochastic optimization approach.

Six regional cases covering nearly the whole European continent were developed in order to cast a view on grid planning in Europe till 2050.

FlexPlan ended up by formulating guidelines for regulators and planning offices of system operators by indicating to what extent system flexibility can contribute to the reduction of overall system costs (operational + investment) yet maintaining current system security levels and which regulatory provisions could foster such process.

After presenting a short overview of the project motivation and goals, the present report concentrates on the final regulatory reflections and the elaboration of the final regulatory guidelines.

Each country offers a wide choice of different legal forms of organizations for a newly created energy community entity, which leads to a wildly grown landscape. They are actually generally limited to a certain redistribution of cash flow. Their upgrade to fully integrated supporting the demand response process in distribution and transmission levels will require solid organization forms and business cases. In the technical aspect, remarkable scientific works are being done to improve the load matching of individual customers and at the community level. However, none of these studies considers the grid, constraints, challenges, and coordinated operation, so the solutions are not directly practicable on a large scale.

This paper first gives a brief overview of energy communities developments, followed by an analysis of the impact of large-scale implementation of energy communities on the power grids. This is pursued by discussing economic processing in the power industry and business organization, as both are crucial for promoting viable energy communities. The paper finalizes conclusions and recommendations on innovation and research activities.

As part of the IEA TCP for a Co-operative Programme on Smart Grids (ISGAN) Working Group 9,
we access insights from existing European and non-European power systems, markets, and
pilots to understand the issues and implications of flexibility market design.

The main barriers for using distributed flexibility can be grouped into three sub-categories:
• technical barriers • consumer engagement • regulatory barriers

Employing a multi-faceted methodology, the work was initiated with a thorough review of electricity systems in the participating countries. Based on this review, a targeted stakeholder questionnaire, complemented by in-depth interviews with system operators, aggregators, and consumer associations, facilitated not only insights extraction but also a comparative synthesis of stakeholder views.

It can be acknowledged that barriers to distributed flexibility use range from technical constraints to regulatory hurdles, highlighting the absence of a comprehensive regulatory framework. Smart meters, while ubiquitous, still face technical challenges and regulatory barriers impede Distribution System Operators (DSOs) from accessing flexibility resources, necessitating further clarification.

Globally, a consensus emerges on the imperative for refined regulatory frameworks and clarified roles. Challenges persist in technology and infrastructure for measurement and verification, hindering seamless flexibility integration. It could be demonstrated that flexibility potential as a network reinforcement tool faces unpredictability, mitigated by advancements in predictability and regulatory evolution. European perspectives underscore grid topology’s significance in leveraging local flexibilities.

Distinct business models surface across regions, with Austrian Flexibility Service Providers focusing on ancillary services, short-term markets, and Virtual Power Plant (VPP) solutions. Persistent customer engagement challenges highlight the need for education and financial incentives.

In conclusion, the diverse designs of global electricity markets necessitate tailored approaches for the successful implementation of flexibility markets in operational planning. Regulatory clarity and continuous stakeholder engagement emerge as pivotal factors in navigating this evolving energy landscape.