We are delighted to announce that John Moriarty’s EPSRC Fellowship “Optimal prediction in local electricity markets” has been extended for period of three years. This fellowship has so far concentrated on stochastic optimisation problems arising in small energy systems. The continuation of the project, entitled "Markov chain optimisation for energy systems”, shifts the focus to large-scale systems. The research will take both theoretical and applied perspectives, and aims to establish the UK as an international leader in this area.
Power systems are large and complex, so the potential for significant economic and environmental gain through even small increases in efficiency is clear. Despite this, the study of the stochastic optimisation of power systems is still far from maturity. The project will aim to address this issue by developing a novel, scalable approach to optimisation via Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC). It will involve collaborations with researchers at Kings College, London, and Université du Maine, Le Mans. A main innovation of this proposal is to open the area of stochastic optimisation of power systems to the vast mathematical literature on MCMC, with the aim of providing principled approaches where before there were heuristics and simulations.