The investment, part of a two-year project, will help transform the center into a nationally significant testbed for next-generation energy systems, said Olga Lavrova, the NMSU Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer Engineering professor who leads the IDEAL Center.
Source: NMSU Newsroom
By Adriana M. Chávez
Photos By Josh Bachman for NMSU: Courtesy
Cover Photo Caption: Manaswini Gangineni, a postdoctoral researcher at New Mexico State University’s Integrated Digital Enterprise Accelerator Laboratory conducts research at the lab’s facilities on the NMSU main campus. The lab recently received a $31.2 million investment from the New Mexico Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources Department to improve the center’s facilities. (NMSU photo by Josh Bachman)
A large investment by the New Mexico Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources Department promises to boost efforts by New Mexico State University’s College of Engineering to strengthen the state’s electric grid infrastructure, while providing opportunities for students to improve hands-on learning and research opportunities.
Today, the New Mexico Board of Finance approved EMNRD’s $31.2 million investment to expand and modernize NMSU’s Integrated Digital Enterprise Accelerator Laboratory, also known as the IDEAL Center. The investment, part of a two-year project, will help transform the center into a nationally significant testbed for next-generation energy systems, said Olga Lavrova, the NMSU Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer Engineering professor who leads the IDEAL Center. She is also the principal investigator of the project, titled “SMaRT-GRID NM — Smarter, Modernized, and Resilient Technologies for Grid Reliability, Innovation, and Development in New Mexico Communities.”
(Left) Olga Lavrova, New Mexico State University Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer Engineering professor; (Middle) Derrick Aidoo, a Ph.D. student at New Mexico State University’s Integrated Digital Enterprise Accelerator Laboratory; (Right) Xi Lei, Ph.D. student at New Mexico State University’s Integrated Digital Enterprise Accelerator Laboratory. (NMSU photos by Josh Bachman)
“This is a significant investment that will have lasting impact on not just our students involved in energy research, but also the state and potentially the nation,” NMSU President Valerio Ferme said. “This will provide students and researchers with a modern, state-of-the-art facility to further explore how we can improve clean energy access to communities in need.”
“As New Mexico’s land-grant university, NMSU is uniquely positioned to transform innovation into impact,” said Patricia Sullivan, NMSU interim vice president for research. “This investment strengthens our ability to provide real-world testbeds where emerging energy technologies can be validated, refined and accelerated toward deployment. By connecting research, industry and workforce development, we are helping advance solutions that strengthen New Mexico’s economy and energy future.”
What the investment means
The investment will help the center improve its research infrastructure, which focuses on technologies involving energy capture, conversion, storage, and delivery to distribution and transmission grids that provide electricity to consumers. The center performs research and outreach throughout the state to provide grid modernization technologies to all communities.
“This will transform the current IDEAL site into a regional-scale, grid-connected infrastructure serving as a bridge between laboratory-scale research and development and real-world operations, with practical benefits to citizens and communities of New Mexico,” Lavrova said.
Those benefits include access to a more modern and resilient grid, as well as lower-cost and equitable access to clean energy, Lavrova said. The investment also promises to help prepare the infrastructure, workforce and partnerships needed for a more resilient, secure and clean energy future. The center operates equipment that can provide electricity to homes, allowing researchers to experiment on how the power is delivered to those homes before the public can purchase the equipment and install it. The equipment is tested to achieve the best performance, ensuring that the equipment is efficient and provides the highest energy delivery possible.
“Anybody who uses electricity is impacted by this research,” said Manaswini Gangineni, a postdoctoral researcher at the IDEAL Center. “For example, utilities can use this technology to integrate renewable energy sources and critical infrastructures like hospitals can use this technology to develop a reliable power supply.”
Impact of investment
“The global energy transition requires resilient, modernized and cybersecure infrastructure capable of integrating a diverse mix of distributed and centralized energy resources,” Lavrova said. “Through recent legislative and regulatory actions, New Mexico has positioned itself to lead large-scale infrastructure deployment and energy-sector economic growth.”
The IDEAL Center is a state-of-the-art testbed and commercialization accelerator for energy and cybersecurity technologies. This includes grid resiliency, microgrids, integration of renewable energy resources, advanced battery storage, clean hydrogen, electrification of transportation, and cybersecurity for critical infrastructure.
“This is a significant investment that will have lasting impact on not just our students involved in energy research, but also the state and potentially the nation. This will provide students and researchers with a modern, state-of-the-art facility to further explore how we can improve clean energy access to communities in need.”
~NMSU President Valerio Ferme
The EMNRD investment will not only physically expand the center but also help NMSU provide technical education and experiential, hands-on training to students and community members, while supporting cutting-edge research and development, ensuring New Mexico develops a diverse, highly skilled workforce prepared to lead in the 21st-century clean energy economy.
For students, the investment means the IDEAL Center will improve its unique hands-on learning infrastructure, giving them the capability of performing their research on medium- and high-voltage infrastructure and devices. The center will also provide professional education for upskilling the current workforce, as well as workshops and community outreach to share information about grid modernization technologies.
“Energy transformation cannot happen only on paper or in simulation,” Lavrova said. “It requires infrastructure, trained people, industry partnerships, and the ability to test complex systems safely and realistically. That is what the IDEAL Center is built to do.”
Faculty will also benefit from the improved IDEAL Center. The EMNRD investment will create an unmatched large-scale laboratory setting to perform grid-scale research in the areas of grid stability, grid security and protection, power electronics, solid-state transformers, substation automation, cybersecurity, and machine learning artificial intelligence for grid applications.
“The ecosystem will lay the foundations of a new sustainable economy by both creating jobs in the high-tech industry and training the electrical grid workforce of the future from K-12 all the way to Ph.D.,” Lavrova said.
Strengthening research
EMNRD’s investment in NMSU strengthens university’s energy research capacity and positions New Mexico as a leader in practical, hardware-based clean energy innovation. As the state’s land-grant university, NMSU has more than 50 years of expertise in power systems, grid modernization, renewable energy integration and power electronics. NMSU has strong ties to national laboratories, industry partners and state agencies that allow for collaborative research directly addressing the state’s energy challenges.
“This investment is about much more than constructing a facility; it is about building the infrastructure New Mexico needs to lead in the next generation of energy innovation,” said Allen Bottorff, NMSU vice president of administration and finance. “As stewards of public resources, our responsibility is to invest in projects that create long-term value. The IDEAL Center represents exactly that kind of investment. One that will generate returns through innovation, workforce development, economic opportunity, and stronger energy infrastructure for the people of New Mexico.
“This investment represents a transformative step for both NMSU and the State of New Mexico,” said Scott Eschenbrenner, associate vice president for Facilities and Services. “Facilities and Services is honored to help deliver the infrastructure that will support groundbreaking research, workforce development, and technological innovation for decades to come. By building resilient, high-performance research facilities, we are creating an environment where students, faculty, and industry partners can work together to solve some of the most important energy challenges facing our state and nation.”
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