Einladung Chapter Meeting März 2017 2017-02-13

It has been in Darmstadt where Erasmus Kittler established electrical engineering as an academic discipline in 1882. And it has been here where Prof. Hasse co-invented the vector control of induction motors close to 50 years ago.

So Darmstadt obviously is a place to visit for members of this chapter. None the less it has been the first time the IEEE Joint IAS/PELS/IES German Chapter has had a chance to visit the Technical University of Darmstadt, here benefiting from the new Chapter Chairman Prof. Dr. Griepentrog who organized the meeting and even added a visit to the Helmholtz center GSI (Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung = Society for Heavy Ion Research). Adding to the charm of the meeting was sunny early spring weather. Darmstadt, located in the Rheine-Main region being one of the cities where the spring can be observed earliest in Germany.

In the beginning of the meeting Prof. Bakran, the past Chairman of the Chapter took the opportunity to pass the baton or in this case the flag to the new board.

The program of the meeting intended to give an overview over the current focus of research at the departments for power engineering at the University. Ranging from the optimization of a single system, here a Permanent Magnet Flux Switching Machine (FSM) compared to a PMSM, widening the focus to local systems with a presentation about the aspects of interoperability of power electronic devices at a common grid – here calculated by a transformation matrix for the imposed voltages taking into account nonlinear behavior of components.

The distribution network for electric energy, specifically the projected HVDC links from the north of Germany to the south where in focus of the last two presentations. The first one covering technical aspects of the feasibility of Gas Insulated Lines as an alternative to overhead lines which would have to be big ones for the projected power of up to 4GW of the links. The second one addressing the aspects of system stability respectively the additional degrees of freedom arising in the distribution network by a HVDC backbone.
The technical program ended with a chance of intensive discussions in the open labs of the departments.

The first day of the meeting ended with the traditional dinner event – in one of the oldest restaurants of Darmstadt and a fancy one too.

Friday held a second highlight with a visit at the GSI Helmholtz center where Prof. Klingbeil introduced us to the community of electron and ion accelerators and collider being used for different aspects of research and cancer treatment.