Partners

Delft University of Technology

Coordinating institution, with programme coordination and lab management run through the Electrical Sustainable Energy (ESE) department. Delft contributes power system dynamics and modelling, adaptive control and protection, cyber-physical resilience and machine learning; random networks, stochastic processes and statistical monitoring from applied mathematics; advanced control of complex systems; socio-technical and climate-energy-economic modelling; and decentralised networking and human-centric data engineering. Its existing real-time simulation infrastructure produced the first traces of the phenomena UTOPYS is built to study, and its Control Room of the Future (CRoF) supports human-in-the-loop research.

Eindhoven University of Technology

Eindhoven's Electrical Energy Systems (EES) group provides the theoretical underpinnings for grid-edge monitoring and control, self-organising energy systems, and the dynamics and stability of sustainable electricity grids. It also brings decentralised energy management via transactive control and optimisation for grid planning and operation. Complementing this, the Electromechanics and Power Electronics (EPE) group contributes expertise in electrical power conversion and the modelling of power-electronic grid components. The Control Systems (CS) group brings stability analysis using nonlinear Lyapunov methods and energy functions, as well as distributed model predictive control for interconnected power systems. Within UTOPYS, Eindhoven co-leads the breakthroughs on novel control strategies and on policy, markets and regulation, and contributes its Smart Grid lab for real-time research on the transmission-distribution interface.

University of Twente

Twente's Resillient and Intelligent Energy System coalition develops robust, distributed optimisation algorithms for bottom-up energy management systems, along with the tools to validate them in simulation and at real-world test sites. Its work covers cyber-security and energy conversion, including the integration, coordination and control of power-electronics-dominated smart grids and the interoperability of inverter-based resources across microgrids and distribution grids, under both steady-state and transient conditions. Within UTOPYS, Twente takes charge of grid-edge models and tools, interoperability analysis and energy coordination mechanisms.

University of Groningen

Groningen conducts fundamental research in control engineering, systems theory, optimization, and complex networked systems, encompassing model-based and data-driven control, systems integration, and machine learning. In the context of power grids and energy markets, this expertise translates into methods for large-scale distributed control and optimisation, addressing challenges in planning, cybersecurity, privacy, stability, and resilience across microgrids and smart grids. The team’s international standing is reflected in IEEE Fellowships and prestigious personal grants, alongside strong collaborations, particularly with TU Delft.

Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica

Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica, the national research institute for mathematics and computer science. CWI brings multi-agent systems, AI, stochastics, optimisation and scientific computing, both as fundamentals and applied to power systems, including the design of agent-based energy markets and the analysis of rare events. Several of its researchers hold joint professorships at TU Delft and TU/e. The institute has led national and European energy programmes, defined NWO calls on future energy systems, and organised international semester programmes on the mathematics of power systems.

Utrecht University

The Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development works on grand societal challenges where the natural science and social science aspectscomponents cannot be studied in isolation. It brings expertise in integrating renewable energy at the community, national and European scales, spanning technical-economic modelling of energy conversion, transport and storage technologies, energy system modelling planning, new energy market designs, governance of sustainability transitions and innovation dynamics. Its The researchers of the Energy & Materials group lead national- and European-funded projects on offshore wind integrationtransport and storage, large-scale multi-commodity energy system planning, and the short-term market organisation of the Dutch energy system, and hydrogen infrastructure.

Radboud University

The Department of Mathematics works on numerical analysis and computational techniques for uncertainty quantification, inverse problems, and data assimilation with differential equations. In UTOPYS it develops efficient computational tools that combine measurement data with physical modelling to quantify and reduce uncertainty in grid operation across different spatial and temporal scales, including components whose physics needs new mathematical treatment, and assesses the reliability of those methods through numerical analysis. It collaborates with grid operators on congestion management and cable operation.

Erasmus University Rotterdam

Rotterdam brings the legal, regulatory and market-organisation perspective, and has established itself as a pioneer in multi-disciplinary energy research. The Rotterdam School of Management contributes to energy market digitalisation and a substantial record of national and European energy projects. The Erasmus School of Law hosts the Transition to Sustainability in Law and Markets cluster, whose active research addresses regulatory aspects of the energy transition and how law shapes markets.

SURF (Cooperation Partner)

SURF is the ICT cooperative for Dutch education and research. It operates and manages the entire national e-infrastructure and provides services and expertise in computing and networking, data management and storage, and experimental technologies.  SURF supports UTOPYS on matters related to national and international accessibility and research access provision. Furthermore, as a member of the UTOPYS Steering Board, SURF will stay abreast of emerging IT infrastructure challenges and needs of the large-scale research infrastructure and set up partnerships to address these.