Peter W. Sauer
F. PAUL DE MELLO OF ALBANY, NY, USA, passed away on 11 December 2022. He was 95 years old. Paul was born in Goa, India. He attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he earned his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical engineering in 1947 and 1948, respectively. In 1948, he joined the Rio Light and Power Company in Brazil and, over several years, held positions of increasing technical responsibility in system planning and design studies concerning the expansion of the Rio, São Paulo, and City of Santos systems. In 1955, Paul accepted a position at General Electric in Schenectady, where he worked designing control systems for industrial, utility, and aircraft power systems.
In 1969, Paul cofounded Power Technologies, Inc (PTI). He served as vice president and manager of PTI’s consulting services department, and he was active in developing and teaching courses on power system dynamics and power plant controls, teaching more than 2,500 engineers worldwide. Two industry-leading books (Boiler Dynamics and Controls and Power System Dynamics) were published based on Paul’s teachings. He also holds three patents, authored more than 100 technical papers, and has received numerous awards for his work globally.
He was elected an IEEE Fellow in 1974 “for the development of new methods of simulation of power plant and power system dynamic phenomena and their application to practical problems in system design and operation†and was elected to the National Academy of Engineering n 1984 “for major advancements in dynamic analysis of electric power plants and systems benefiting design, control, and training application.†In 2003, Paul was the inaugural recipient of the IEEE Power & Energy Society Charles Concordia Power Systems Engineering Award; he coauthored the seminal paper “Concepts of Synchronous Machine Stability as Affected by Excitation Control†with Charles Concordiain IEEE Transactions on Power Apparatus and Systems in 1969.
Two industryleading books were published based on Paul’s teachings.
IT IS WITH GREAT SADNESS THAT we report the passing of Dr. Peter W. Sauer on 27 December 2022. Peter William Sauer was born on 20 September 1946 in Winona, MN, USA. He lived his early life in Saint Louis, MO, USA, and he completed his undergraduate education in electrical engineering at the University of Missouri at Rolla (later known as Missouri University of Science and Technology). From 1969 to 1973, he was the electrical engineer on a design assistance team for the Tactical Air Command at Langley Air Force Base, VA, USA, working on the design and construction of airfield lighting and electrical distribution systems. He obtained the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Purdue University in 1974 and 1977, respectively. He had been on the faculty at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign since 1977.
Pete was always fascinated by complicated aspects of electric circuits, particularly mathematical formulations of ac and electromechanical devices. His doctoral research work related to probabilistic methods for the analysis of electric power systems. This is a complicated subject because of the uncertainty associated with the variability over time of the power system electrical loads. The result of this research was the development of the “probabilistic load flow study,†which has been researched further since Pete’s initial work in 1977.
Part of Pete’s work related to the use of mathematical series formulations of probability density functions with a basic formulation known as the Gram–Charlier series. He went on to pioneer the use of singular perturbation methods for the development of reduced-order models of synchronous generators and induction models. These reduced-order models are much simpler than previous models, yet they still capture the phenomena that are relevant in power system electromechanical transients. As such, the simplified models are extremely useful for analysis, simulation, and control system design.
The legacy of his work in model-order reduction is highly relevant today, with his techniques being used for developing reduced-order models of inverter-interfaced power generation resources. These modern electric generators are poised to replace large synchronous generators in a quest to decrease dependence on fossil fuels for electricity production.
Pete was a Fellow of IEEE and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, and he was also awarded the IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) Outstanding Power Engineering Educator Award and the Nikola Tesla Award. He was an active volunteer in PES, and he served in several significant roles on technical committees and the governing board.
Pete joined the faculty of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Illinois in 1977, which was to be a 45-year distinguished career at that university. From August 1991 to August 1992, he served as the program director for the Power Systems Program in the Electrical and Communication Systems Division of the National Science Foundation in Washington, DC, USA. Also, he was a cofounder of the PowerWorld Corporation and served as chairman of its board of directors from 1996 to 2001. Pete was very active in many phases of power engineering education and professional development. He was a cofounder of the Power Systems Engineering Research Center (PSerc) and served as the Illinois site director of PSerc from 1996 to 2015. He was also the coleader of several research centers focused on developing a trustworthy cyber infrastructure for the power grid. At the time of his death, he was the Grainger Chair Emeritus Professor of Electrical Engineering.
For the period 1969–1998, Pete served in the U.S. Air Force reserves. He retired from military service as a lieutenant colonel in 1998.
A description of Pete Sauer’s work is incomplete without describing his family and his personal contributions to education and the community. Pete married Sylvia L. Stenzel in 1969, and they raised a very successful family with two children, Daniel A. and Katherine D. as well as grandchildren Evan and Tate Sauer and Julian and Margot McMahon. The Sauers were active in Trinity Lutheran Church in Urbana, IL, USA. Pete was an officer in that church, and he brought ideas about infrastructure administration and membership participation to engineering meetings. For example, if a member misses three successive meetings of a church committee in Urbana, he/she is dropped from committee membership. That is still the same rule used in the Power Engineering Education Committee of PES.
When Pete was asked to supply a summary statement of his teaching philosophy, he stated, “Students are candles to be lighted, not bottles to be filled.†This is a statement paraphrased from Plutarch and passed down to Pete from his father, a Lutheran minister. The statement seems to summarize how Peter Sauer treated his educational and professional assignments.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPE.2023.3235030
Date of current version: 15 February 2023
