Dr. Petr Musilek received an Ing. degree in Electrical Engineering (1991) and a Ph.D. degree in Technical Cybernetics (1995) from the Military Technical Academy in Brno, Czech Republic. In 1997, he was awarded a NATO Science Fellowship, tenured at the Intelligent Systems Research Laboratory, University of Saskatchewan, Canada. Since 1999, he has been with the University of Alberta, where he is presently a Professor and an Associate Chair (Research and Planning). He is a registered Professional Engineer in Alberta (APEGA), and a Senior Member of IEEE.

Research

Dr. Musilek’s energy-related research focuses on the use of ICT to support the design and operation of future electric power grids. He studies the integration of renewables and distributed energy resources (DER) in power systems, concentrating on the energy management of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems, battery energy storage systems (BESS), and electric vehicles. He also examines how weather impacts the energy production and consumption patterns, and the characteristics and integrity of the power delivery infrastructure (dynamic thermal rating, ice accretion). To deal with the complexity and uncertainty of modern distributed energy systems, he often employs high-performance computing and methods of computational intelligence, including machine learning, neural networks, fuzzy systems, evolutionary computing, and swarm systems. His current projects include:

  • transcative energy markets
  • reinforcement learning of energy trading agents
  • energy production and load forecasting using deep neural networks
  • energy aspects of smart homes and smart communities
  • energy storage system for residential and industrial applications
  • system integration of vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) systems
  • advanced data analytics for energy systems

Currently and in the past, my research has been supported by the following agencies CFI, CFREF, MITACS, NSERC, and by a number of industrial sponsors and research partners, including Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO), Altalink, ATCO Electric, ENMAX, EPCOR, FortisAlberta, ReWatt Power, NVIDIA, BC Transmission Corporation, BC Hydro, Bonneville Power Administration, EDF Energy, Hydro Quebec, NALCOR Energy, NB Power, TEPCO, and Landmark group.