Home - Amritanshu Pandey

Hi, welcome to my webpage. I am an Assistant Professor in Electrical Engineering at the University of Vermont with an adjunct appointment in the Engineering and Public Policy Department at Carnegie Mellon University. I work on any and all technologies related to electrical energy systems that will help combat climate change. I develop these technologies using circuit theory, nonlinear optimization, machine learning, and numerical methods.

Key areas of interest are renewable integration, grid reliability and resilience, cybersecurity, digital twins, electric mobility, sustainable smart cities, and energy equity. In the past, at Carnegie Mellon, I (along with my dear colleagues) developed a novel circuit-theoretic simulation and optimization framework for power grids. The project culminated in a new grid analytics tool: Simulation of Unified Grid Analysis and Renewables (SUGAR), which has since been commercialized at Pearl Street Technologies, Inc.

For any research- or academic life-related discussions, you can reach me at amritanshu.pandey@uvm.edu

Prospective doctoral and post-doctoral candidates: I am always looking for promising candidates who want to solve critical challenges in the sustainable and equitable electric grid transition. If you have interest, please email me at amritanshu.pandey@uvm.edu with your CV, transcripts, and a short paragraph describing your future goals in the email.

Research Interest Keywords

Grid Simulation and Optimization
Grid Cybersecurity
Modeling of Future Energy Systems
Electric Vehicle Integration
Power Grid Digital Twins
Decarbonization and Electrification
Energy Equity

Projects

Simulation of Unified Grid Analyses and Renewables (SUGAR)

The broad goal of this research is to develop circuit-theoretic methods and heuristics to enable faster yet robust simulations and optimizations for future grids of tomorrow.
Simulations and Optimizations of Large-scale Energy Systems

Tackling climate change will require efficient and flexible use of all grid resources ranging from IoT-controlled small house loads to variable renewable resources. In part, the operability and reliability of the energy system in this paradigm will require a new array of simulation and optimization methods that address existing challenges with analyses of very large-scale networks (think 10s to 100s of millions of decision variables).

If a cross between energy systems and distributed compute algorithms excites you, this project might be a great fit for you as well.
Grid Cybersecurity

Grid cyber threats are growing due to evolving attack surface, which is both i) diverse (ranging from easy-access less-secure IoT devices to highly secure nuclear assets) and ii) large (consider billions of grid-connected IoT devices in the next decade). In this future paradigm, cyber-attacks can range from a simple flip of the switch to sophisticated chain-of-events attacks. As such, the goal of this project is to develop methods that strengthen the modern grid against a broad range of cyber threats including those that originate from complex chain-like attack vectors.
Grid State Estimation and Anomaly Detection

Traditional AC State Estimation (ACSE) methods are non-convex and are prone to divergence or convergence to non-physical solutions. With increasing penetration of cheap sensing devices (IoT-based or otherwise) in the distribution grid, there is a potential for reinventing the approach by which the grid states are estimated. Addressing the needs of future grids, such an approach will have to include novel grid components such as electric vehicles, distributed resources, and sensing devices while also being resilient against bad-data and cyber-attacks. This project addresses this gap.
Modeling and Simulation of Electric Vehicle Infrastructure

High penetration of electric vehicles will significantly increase the electricity demand across the globe and require a major overhaul of the grid infrastructure. This revolution is likely to impact the ways in which city-wide and sub-urban distribution grids are operated and designed. Existing modeling and simulation methods do not fully address the needs for analyzing the impact of electrified transportation on electric grid infrastructure. My goal is to work with students and researchers to invent and develop new modeling and simulation capabilities that addresses this gap to help world advance to a carbon-neutral future.
Quantifying Energy Equity

While the technological bottlenecks of large-scale integration of distributed resources are being actively and extensively evaluated, the societal impacts are only being addressed more recently. In this project, we are answering questions like: how are the various emerging technologies likely to impact different communities? Given the onerous upgrades to the distribution grid, who is likely to pay for it? Going beyond just the cost-shifts, what are the reliability and resiliency shifts in the communities due to the emerging technologies?

Publications

Journal Articles

A. Gautam, D. Nock and A. Pandey, “Grid-Aware Tradeoff Analysis for Outage Mitigation Microgrids at Emerging Resilience Hubs,” in IEEE Transactions on Energy Markets, Policy and Regulation, vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 186-199, June 2024.
S. Li, A. Pandey, and L. Pileggi. ” Gridwarm: Contingency Analyses with Warm Starter using Probabilistic Graphical Model.” Electric Power Systems Research – Special Issue Dedicated to the XXIII Power Systems Computation Conference, accepted for publication, 2024.
P. Sang, A. Pandey, “Circuit-theoretic Joint Parameter-State Estimation — Balancing Optimality and AC Feasibility,” Electric Power Systems Research – Special Issue Dedicated to the XXIII Power Systems Computation Conference, 2024.
A. Agarwal, A. Pandey, and L. Pileggi. “Continuous Switch Model and Heuristics for Mixed-Integer Nonlinear Problems in Power Systems.” IEEE Transactions on Power Systems 2023
T. Mishra, A. Pandey, M. Almassalkhi, “Predictive Optimization of Hybrid Energy Systems with Temperature Dependency” Electric Power Systems Research – Special Issue Dedicated to the XXIII Power Systems Computation Conference, accepted for publication, 2024.
S. Li, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “A Convex Method of Generalized State Estimation using Circuit-theoretic Node-breaker Model.” IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, 2023.
A. Pandey, M. R. Almassalkhi, & S. Chevalier,” Large-Scale Grid Optimization: the Workhorse of Future Grid Computations,” Curr Sustainable Renewable Energy Rep (2023), Springer Nature, https://doi.org/10.1007/s40518-023-00213-6.
K. Abiodun, A. Gautam, A. Newman, D. Nock, A. Pandey (2022) The Role of Microgrids in Advancing Energy Equity Through Access and Resilience. INFORMS TutORials in Operations Research null(null):175-190. https://doi.org/10.1287/educ.2022.0244
A. Agarwal, A. Pandey, N. T. Bandele, L. Pileggi, ”Generalized Smooth Functions for Modeling Steady-State Response of Controls in Transmission and Distribution,” Electric Power Systems Research, Volume 213, 2022.
S. Li, A. Pandey, B. Hooi, C. Faloutsos and L. Pileggi, Dynamic graph-based anomaly detection in the electrical grid. IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, 2021, 37(5), 3408-3422.
N. Bandele, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “A Risk-Managed Steady-State Analysis to Assess The Impact of Power Grid Uncertainties.” (Preprint)
T. McNamara, A. Pandey, A. Agarwal, L. Pileggi, “Two-Stage Homotopy Method to Incorporate Discrete Control Variables into AC-OPF,” Electric Power Systems Research (Special Issue for Power Systems Computation Conference), 2022.
E. Foster, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “Three-Phase Infeasibility Analysis for Distribution Grid Studies,” Electric Power Systems Research (Special Issue for Power Systems Computation Conference), 2022.
S. Zhang, A. Pandey, Xiaochuan Luo, M. Powell, R. Banerji, L. Fan, A. Parchure, E. Luzcando, “Practical Adoption of Cloud Computing in Power Systems—Drivers, Challenges, Guidance, and Real-World Use Cases,” in IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, vol. 13, no. 3, pp. 2390-2411, May 2022, doi: 10.1109/TSG.2022.3148978.
M.Jereminov, D.M. Bromberg, A. Pandey, M.R. Wagner, and L. Pileggi, “Evaluating Feasibility within Power Flow,” IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, vol. 11, No. 4, July 2020.
A. Pandey and L. Pileggi, ”Steady-State Simulation for Combined Transmission and Distribution Systems,” in IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, vol. 11, no. 2, pp. 1124-1135, March 2020.
A. Agarwal, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “Robust event-driven dynamic simulation using power flow,” Electric Power Systems Research, vol. 189, 2020.
M. Jereminov, A. Pandey and L. Pileggi, ”Equivalent Circuit Formulation for Solving AC Optimal Power Flow,” in IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, vol. 34, no. 3, pp. 2354-2365, May 2019.
A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, M. R. Wagner, D. M. Bromberg, G. Hug and L. Pileggi, “Robust Power Flow and Three-Phase Power Flow Analyses,” in IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, vol. 34, no. 1, pp. 616-626, Jan. 2019.

Book Chapter

A. Pandey, S. Li, and L. Pileggi. “Combined transmission and distribution state-estimation for future electric grids.” Power Systems Operation with 100% Renewable Energy Sources. Elsevier, 2024. 299-315.
A. Pandey (2023), “Circuit-Based Electromagnetic Transient Simulation”, Foundations and Trends® in Electric Energy Systems: Vol. 6: No. 2, pp 83-118. http://dx.doi.org/10.1561/3100000038

Conference Proceedings

M. H. Ali and A. Pandey, “Distributed Primal-Dual Interior Point Framework for Analyzing Infeasible Combined Transmission and Distribution Grid Networks”, 58th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, Hawaii, USA, 2025
M. Fore, S. Singh, C. Lee, A. Pandey, A. Anastasopoulos, and D. Stamoulis, “Unlearning Climate Misinformation in Large Language Models”, In Proceedings of the 1st Workshop on Natural Language Processing Meets Climate Change (ClimateNLP 2024), pages 178–192, Association for Computational Linguistics, Bangkok, Thailand, 2024.
E. Badmus, A. Pandey, “ANOCA: AC Network-aware Optimal Curtailment Approach for Dynamic Hosting Capacity,” 63rd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, Milan, 2024.
D. Hamilton, S. Chevalier, A Pandey, M Almassalkhi, “Towards Energysheds: A Technical Definition and Cooperative Framework for Future Power System Operations,” 63rd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, Milan, 2024.
E. Foster, T. McNamara, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “Actionable Three-Phase Infeasibility Optimization with Varying Slack Sources,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Orlando, 2023.
B. Singer, A. Pandey, S. Li, L. Bauer, C. Miller, L. Pileggi, & V. Sekar. Shedding light on inconsistencies in grid cybersecurity: Disconnects and recommendations. In 2023 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP) (pp. 38-55). IEEE (2023, May).
S. Li, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “A WLAV-based Robust Hybrid State Estimation using Circuit-theoretic Approach,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Washington DC, 2021. (Best paper award)
N. T. Bandele, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “Analytical Inverter-Based Distributed Generator Model for Power Flow Analysis,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Washington DC, 2021.
A. Agarwal, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, “Fast AC Steady-State Power Grid Simulation and Optimization using Prior Knowledge,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Washington DC, 2021. (Best-of-the-best paper award)
A. Pandey, A. Agarwal, L. Pileggi, “Incremental Model Building Homotopy Approach for Solving Exact AC-Constrained Optimal Power Flow,” Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences-54, Hawaii, 2021.
S. Li, A. Pandey, A. Agarwal, M. Jereminov, L. Pileggi, “A LASSO-Inspired Approach for Localizing Power System Infeasibility,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Montreal, 2020.
S. Li, A. Pandey, S. Kar, L. Pileggi, “A Circuit-Theoretic Approach to State Estimation,” IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies, Hague, Europe, 2020.
A. Pandey, A. Agarwal, M. Jereminov, B. Rawn, T. Nwachuku and L. Pileggi, “Improving Voltage Profile of the Nigerian Power Grid,” in Proc. IEEE PES/IAS PowerAfrica Conference, Abuja, Nigeria, August 2019.
M. R. Wagner, M. Jereminov, A. Pandey, and L. Pileggi, “A Probabilistic Approach to Power System State Estimation using a Linear Algorithm,” in IEEE Conference on Environment and Electrical Engineering and I&CPS, Genova, Italy, 2019.
A. Pandey, A. Agarwal, M. Jereminov, M.R. Wagner, D.M. Bromberg, L. Pileggi, “Robust Sequential Steady-State Analysis of Cascading Outages,” IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Europe Conference, Bucharest, Romania, Sep. 2019.
M. Jereminov, A. Terzakis, M. Wagner, A. Pandey and L. Pileggi, “Robust and Efficient Power Flow Convergence with G-min Stepping Homotopy Method,” 2019 IEEE International Conference on Environment and Electrical Engineering and 2019 IEEE Industrial and Commercial Power Systems Europe (EEEIC / I&CPS Europe), Genova, Italy, 2019.
A. Agarwal, A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, L. Pileggi, “Implicitly Modeling Frequency Control with Power Flow,” IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Europe Conference, Bucharest, Romania, Sep. 2019.
M. Jereminov, B. Hooi, A. Pandey, H. Song, C. Faloutsos and L. Pileggi, “Impact of Load Models on Power Flow Optimization,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Atlanta, GA, August 2019.
B. Hooi, D. Eswaran, A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, L. Pileggi, and C. Faloutsos, “ChangeDAR: Online Localized Change Detection for Sensor Data on a Graph,” ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), 2018.
B. Hooi, D. Eswaran, H. A. Song, A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, L. Pileggi, and C. Faloutsos, “GridWatch: Sensor Placement and Anomaly Detection in the Electrical Grid,” European Conference on Machine Learning and Principles and Practice of Knowledge Discovery in Databases (ECML-PKDD), 2018. (Best Student Data Mining Paper Runner-up)
M. R. Wagner, A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, and L. Pileggi, “Robust Probabilistic Analysis of Transmission Power Systems based on Equivalent Circuit Formulation,” Proceedings of the International Conference on Probabilistic Methods Applied to Power Systems, June 2018.
B. Hooi, H. A. Song, A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, L. Pileggi, and C. Faloutsos,”StreamCast: Fast and Online Mining of Power Grid Time Sequences,” SIAM International Conference on Data Mining (SDM), 2018.
A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, M. R. Wagner, G. Hug, L. Pileggi, “Robust Convergence of Power Flow using Tx Stepping Method with Equivalent Circuit Formulation,” Power System Computation Conference, Dublin, Ireland, 2018.
A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, G. Hug, L. Pileggi, “Improving Power Flow Robustness via Circuit Simulation Methods,” IEEE PES General Meeting, Chicago, 2017. (Best Paper Award)
M. Jereminov, A. Pandey, H. A. Song, B. Hooi, C. Faloutsos and L. Pileggi, “Linear load model for robust power system analysis,” 2017 IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Conference Europe (ISGT-Europe), Torino, Italy, 2017.
H. A. Song, B. Hooi, M. Jereminov, A. Pandey, L. Pileggi, C. Faloutsos, “PowerCast: Mining and forecasting power grid sequences,” Joint European Conference on Machine Learning and Knowledge Discovery in Databases, Springer 2017.
A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, X. Li, G. Hug, L. Pileggi, “Aggregated Load and Generation Equivalent Circuit Models with Semi-Empirical Data Fitting,” IEEE Green Energy and Systems Conference (IGESC 2016), November 2016.
M. Jereminov, A. Pandey, D. M. Bromberg, X. Li, G. Hug and L. Pileggi, “Steady-state analysis of power system harmonics using equivalent split-circuit models,” 2016 IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Conference Europe (ISGT-Europe), Ljubljana, Slovenia, 2016.
A. Pandey, M. Jereminov, X. Li, G. Hug, L. Pileggi, “Unified Power System Analyses and Models using Equivalent Circuit Formulation,” IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies, Minneapolis, MN, 2016.
M. Jereminov, D. Bromberg, A. Pandey, G. Hug, X. Li and L. Pileggi, “An Equivalent Circuit Formulation for Three-Phase Power Flow Analysis of Distribution Systems,” IEEE PES Transmission and Distribution Conference, Dallas, TX, May 2016.
A. Pandey and G. Hug, “Quantifying operational flexibility of VSC-HVDC lines and SVCs,” 2013 IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting, Vancouver, BC, 2013.