Impacts of Energy Storage Facilities on Resilient Operation of Multi-Carrier Energy Hub Systems

Nowadays, with respect to the new strategic insight into the management of power systems, the grids are inevitably restructuring from centralized networks toward multiple sub-systems encompassing many local networks and microgrids. Hence, during the recent decade, the necessity for the deployment of multi-carrier energy hub schemes has assumed special attention. An energy hub scheme is a kind of multi-carrier system which is capable of converting, storing, and transmitting energy carriers from inputs toward outputs. The energy hub system acts as a connector and interface between consumers and energy infrastructures to maintain the demand reliably and optimally in terms of economy. Due to the uncertainty of parameters, volatile conditions, and widespread pervasiveness, the accurate modeling of hub systems seems to be indispensable. Such schemes have witnessed significant revolutionary developments and have undergone innovative progress during recent years. In this study, a new model for the hub scheme is proposed encompassing two types of thermal and electrical storage units in addition to an objective function for operation under normal and faulty conditions. Thus, the impacts of the presence of storage facilities on the optimal operation of the hub scheme regarding resilience objectives and total operation cost are investigated. This non-linear, non-convex, and non-smooth problem is optimized using a novel metaheuristic solver called Slime Mould Algorithm (SMA), which has demonstrated a stunning performance in terms of accuracy and computation metrics. The results allude to the prominent virtues of the proposed hub scheme in diminishing operation cost and augmenting reliability and resilience of supply.