DRAGon, CLENAR 2025 Renewable Energy Award: artificial intelligence to integrate more renewables without building new power lines

CIRCE Technology Center has received the Renewable Energy Award at the 4th edition of the Energy Awards of the Aragón Energy Cluster (CLENAR), presented during Energy Night 2025. The award recognizes DRAGon, an artificial-intelligence-based tool that optimizes the use of the existing power grid and enables greater integration of clean energy. The CLENAR Awards honor, across eight categories, initiatives with an impact on the energy sector, giving particular weight to their technical and economic feasibility, scalability and replicability, and appropriate integration into their environment.

The jury highlighted DRAGon’s contribution to one of the most significant technical challenges of the energy transition: integrating more renewable generation without compromising supply security. The tool makes it possible to increase the usable capacity of already-installed electrical infrastructure immediately, without the need to build new lines in the short term.

The power grid, key to making full use of installed renewables

The rapid expansion of solar and wind power has increased demands on transmission and distribution networks, which must manage higher and more variable flows. During many hours of the year, the limiting factor is not generation capacity but transport capacity, leading to preventive constraints and renewable curtailment. Digital solutions such as DRAGon address this operational need by enabling more precise use of the grid’s real margins.

Real-time prediction of safe capacity

DRAGon continuously analyzes the behavior of lines, cables, and substations, and predicts hours in advance how much energy they can safely carry. This foresight helps operators integrate more renewables in each time slot, reduce overload risks, and minimize clean-energy curtailment, contributing to a more efficient, reliable, and resilient grid.

More usable capacity without new infrastructure

By working with real data and predictive models, DRAGon unlocks available capacity that is left unused when the grid operates with conservative fixed limits. This makes it possible to increase renewable penetration in practical terms, containing system costs and postponing physical reinforcements that are only necessary in specific scenarios.

Dynamic Line Rating enhanced with predictive AI

The solution is built on the Dynamic Line Rating (DLR) paradigm, which adjusts line capacity to real operating conditions—such as weather, conductor temperature, or load level—instead of using static values. DRAGon also incorporates predictive artificial intelligence, allowing it not only to estimate current capacity but to anticipate it with enough lead time to improve decision-making in day-to-day operations.

A project born from CIRCE’s internal AI OlympIAds

DRAGon emerged from CIRCE’s first Artificial Intelligence OlympIAds, an initiative aimed at turning real energy challenges into applicable solutions through advanced use of data and predictive models. Its development strengthens a strategic line of work focused on grid digitalization and the practical application of AI to accelerate decarbonization.

With this recognition, CIRCE reinforces its commitment to the energy transition through solutions that combine digital innovation and energy expertise, helping to maximize the use of renewables already deployed and to move toward power grids ready for the new energy mix.