February 18, 2025 - Energy Academic Group
Microgrids and the NPS: Our Research Impact With the Navy and Beyond
Richard Alves
Faculty Associate, Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø
Abstract
In his talk, Richard Alves will describe ongoing research and education efforts in the NPS Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and Systems Engineering departments related to microgrids and high-power electronics systems. This work is vital to the NPS mission of supporting the warfighter in an era of growing needs for energy assurance on the battlespace. Mr. Alves will give an overview of the state-of-the-art microgrid systems being implemented at NPS to further our understanding and adoption of key power distribution and energy storage technologies, and what efforts are being taken to educate future leaders on these systems with hands-on learning using hardware seen in the field.
Biography
Mr. Richard Alves is an electrical engineer with a background in power electronics, material fabrication, and manufacturing. He currently manages the ECE Power and Energy Lab space and oversees microgrid research efforts.
Mr. Alves graduated from UC Santa Cruz with a BS in Electrical Engineering in 2019. Throughout his undergraduate, he contributed to projects involving microgrids and the electrification of vehicles. His notable activities included building avionics for a NASA collegiate rocketry competition, designing an autonomous boat with its own microgrid, and researching nano-magnetic materials as a member of the UCSC Applied Optics Group. From 2018-2019, he served as student body president of the UCSC Sustainability Lab, a group whose focus is on delivering relevant training and opportunities for undergraduates to tackle water and energy security.
After his time as a research technician with the NPS Physics Department, Mr. Alves joined the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department in January 2024 in the role of faculty associate. In just one year of work, he has designed and built three microgrids on the NPS campus, resuscitated microgrids located at the annex facility, and programmed part of the NPS webapp tools (). He co-authored a paper on zonal nanogrid reliability in 2024 and is now authoring papers focused on digital twin applications and generator optimization algorithms for microgrids. Additionally, he has researched solid-state circuit breakers and heatsink performance for aircraft under Dr. Di Zhang and Dr. Yuntao Xu. When not performing research, he supports and maintains the ECE student laboratories and is a second reader to many student theses.
Mr. Alves is currently pursuing his master’s degree under the guidance of Dr. Giovanna Oriti and is expected to graduate in the Spring of 2027 with concentrations in power systems and device electronics.