An Immersive Visualization Tool for Teaching and Simulation of Smart Grid Technologies

TL;DR

This paper presents an immersive visualization tool using large-scale centers like planetariums to simulate and interact with smart grid technologies, enhancing research and education in power systems.

Contribution

It introduces a novel immersive platform for smart grid simulation that supports real-time multi-user interaction for education and research purposes.

Findings

Enables real-time multi-user interaction with smart grid simulations.

Facilitates community education through immersive visualization.

Serves as a research platform for testing algorithms and hardware.

Abstract

Intelligent power grid research, i.e. smart grid, involves many simultaneous users spread over a relatively large geographical area. A tool for advancing research and community education is presented utilizing large-scale visualization centers, e.g. planetariums, in simulating smart grid interactions. This approach immerses the user in virtual smart grid visualization and allows the user, with several other users, to interact in real time. This facilitates community education by demonstrating how the power grid functions with smart technologies. The simulation is sophisticated enough to also be used as a research tool for industry and higher education to test software algorithms, deployment strategies, communications protocols, and even new hardware.