Alipour to enhance resiliency of electrical power networks using NHERI FIU Wall of Wind

Published on August 23, 2018

Professor Alice Alipour will be using the Wall of Wind facilities in her work to improve resilience of electrical power networks. (Photo: Iowa State University College of Engineering)

Alice Alipour, assistant professor of civil, construction, and environmental engineering at Iowa State University, recently received the 2018 National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award. The award recognizes junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholar through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research.

Alipour currently leads a team of nine PhD and mastersÂ’ students working on the performance of complex infrastructure systems under extreme events. Their research projects mainly span an interconnection of structural engineering, applied statists and network theory, seeking to investigate the key attributes contributing to the resiliency of infrastructure. This involves uncertainty quantification, extreme event characterization, and development of high-fidelity predictive tools to quantify the impact of hazards on infrastructure components.

The CAREER project led by Alipour aims to advance the scientific knowledge underlying the design, assessment, and management of transmission line systems with the goal of enhancing the resiliency of electric power networks (EPNs) under multiple hazards.

The research will make fundamental contributions in development of high-fidelity computational models that are supported by experimental data attained from the NSF-supported Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) Wall of Wind Experimental Facility at Florida International University. Metamodels of the EPN components, combined with the computational models, will be employed for uncertainty quantification. The novel integration of component- and network-level performance measures into an optimization platform will allow for inclusion of consequences of possible failures and adjustment of design requirements accordingly.

Through this CAREER award, Alipour has received $500,000 over five years for fundamental research, education, and outreach activities related to resiliency of EPNs under multiple hazards. This will have a positive impact on the development of a new generation of workforce in natural hazards engineering with an immediate contribution to enhancing the community resilience.