René Kamphuis

Dynamic pricing by scalable energy management systems — Field experiences and simulation results using PowerMatcher

Response of demand, distributed generation and electricity storage (e.g. vehicle to grid) will be crucial for power systems management in the future smart electricity grid. In this paper, we describe a smart grid technology that integrates demand and supply flexibility in the operation of the electricity system through the use of dynamic pricing. Over the last few years, this technology has been researched and developed into a market-ready system, and has been deployed in a number of successful field trials. Recent field experiences and simulation studies show the potential of the technology for network operations (e.g. congestion management and black-start support), for market operations (e.g. virtual power plant operations), and integration of large-scale wind power generation. The scalability of the technology, i.e. the ability to perform well under mass-application circumstances, has been proved in a targeted field experiment. This paper gives an overview of the results of two field trials and three simulation studies. In these trials and simulations, demand and supply response from real and simulated electrical vehicles, household appliances and heating systems (heat pumps and micro co-generation) has been successfully coordinated to reach specific smart grid goals.

PowerMatching City, a living lab smart grid demonstration

PowerMatching City is a living lab Smart Grid demonstration in the Netherlands consisting of 25 interconnected households (phase-I). It focuses on the development of a market model for intelligent network operation under normal market conditions that allows simultaneous in-home optimization (pro-sumer), technical coordination (distribution system operator) and commercial coordination (balance responsible). The coordination mechanism, provided by the agent based PowerMatcher technology, is extended to allow these simultaneous optimizations. Mature smart grids require a transparent coordination mechanism which allows various energy sources and appliances to be interconnected on a non-segregated and plug-in basis. It should seamlessly combine distributed generation with demand response. A generic design has been developed that allows seamless coordination of hybrid heat pumps, µ-CHPs, electric cars, smart appliances such as freezers, washing machines etc. in a single ICT solution. End-user acceptance is guaranteed by advanced comfort control mechanisms and monitored in a participating design program.

Balancing wind power fluctuations with a domestic Virtual Power Plant in Europe's First Smart Grid

The use of renewable energy source for the transition towards a sustainable future imposes a number of new challenges for the electricity grid, one of them being the balancing of supply and demand. The flexibility in Virtual Power Plants can be used within a Smart Grid to dampen the intermittent behavior of wind and solar energy. In the Dutch Smart Grids pilot “PowerMatching City”, a domestic virtual power plant has been created that can shifts its energy demand and production. One of the cases studies was to use this flexibility to compensate the imbalance caused by wind energy.

INTEGRAL: ICT-Platform Based Distributed Control in Electricity Grids with a Large Share of Distributed Energy Resources and Renewable Energy Sources

The European project INTEGRAL aims to build and demonstrate an industry-quality reference solution for DER aggregation-level control and coordination, based on commonly available ICT components, standards, and platforms. To achieve this, the Integrated ICT-platform based Distributed Control (IIDC) is introduced. The project includes also three field test site installations in the Netherlands, Spain and France, covering normal, critical and emergency grid conditions.

High concentration of heat pumps in suburban areas and reduction of their impact on the electricity network

One of the challenges of the near future for a more renewable Dutch electricity infrastructure is the embedding of high concentrations of heat pumps in currently built domestic residences. In the Dutch situation demand of electricity occurs simultaneously with demand of heat, high electricity peak loads in the low voltage network are expected. This study focuses on domestic residences with high peak loads at substations when heating is provided merely by heat pumps with additional electric resistance heating. Two scenarios are studied: the event of a black start in the electricity system and high electricity demand on a day with a very low outdoor temperature. The simulation is performed with agents representing up to 100 dwellings based on Multiagent control by means of the PowerMatcher concept. In the PowerMatcher concept software agents are used as representatives of the power producing and/or consuming installations. The results demonstrate significant peak load reduction can be achieved at the expense of only a small decrease of comfort. The cost reduction calculation of the electricity network using Multiagent systems is presented. An estimation of this reduction, which is very location specific, includes the substation, the low voltage network, the transmission station and the medium voltage transport network.

Architectures for novel energy infrastructures: Multi-agent based coordination patterns

Due to the increased proportion of small renewable energy sources in a distributed setting (DG-RES), active control of small distributed energy producing and consuming systems will play an important role in future electricity grids [1]. These distributed energy resources have production patterns, which are either partially stochastic (e.g. wind, solar cells) or are coupled to the primary user process (e.g. co-generation of heat and electricity). Furthermore, on the demand-side, and increasingly on the electricity storage side, opportunities exist for actively serving stability applications in the grid by real-time supply/demand coordination. In the future, an information and communication layer for grid coordination could serve a portfolio of ICT-applications on timescales running from seconds to hours. To get a grip on these (r)evolutionary developments, possibly toppling the electricity grid, in this paper, architecture requirements for future high proportion DG-RES electricity grids are collected from a Power Electronics System point of view as well as from an ICT point of view using an inventory of business models in the power grid that focus on coordination of multiple small-scale DG-RES resources. Modeled from an ICT point-of-view, these give rise to architectures for applications that can successively be implemented in hardware and software as active components in the distribution grid. A number of possible grid control strategy coordination patterns (GCPs), which are defined in a generic, reusable manner, can be seen to emerge. GCPs, connected and intertwined to one another on several layers (physical, commercial) of the grid, together, can provide the framework for coordination in the overall intelligent grid. Bottom-up approaches of implementing coordination in future active grids appear to be the method of choice to use in implementing the GCPs. Software agents [2], [3] coordinating primary processes using market algorithms, as implemented in the PowerMatcher approach [3]-[4], appear to be very suited for this.

DREAM: An ICT architecture framework for heterarchical coordination in power systems

Agent based techniques are used to coordinate demand and supply for increasing the embedding capacity of dispersed, badly predictable, renewable energy based power systems. VPPs (Virtual Power Plants) using this technology have demonstrated their feasibility in field tests and currently are scaled up to satisfy requirements for massive rollout [1]. These agent-based VPPs mostly are used in normal operating conditions of electricity grids. The VPPs typically have one fixed configuration that agents use for coordination. More operational flexibility can be achieved if VPP-configurations can be switched depending upon the current status of the grid (normal, critical, emergency [2]) in a hierarchical fashion. The DREAM software architecture framework is designed to satisfy the requirements for heterarchic operation of the grid. In this paper the design considerations are discussed, an in-depth analysis of the package structure for the information architecture components and a number of applications is presented.

OS4ES: Increasing awareness of DG-RES and demand response processes by registry enabled services

Today, mass presence of distributed energy resources (DERs) connected to the grid is often seen as having adverse effects on grid reliability and robustness. The apprehension is that it complicates or even compromises network management by distribution system operators (DSOs). The central aim of the Open System for Energy Services (OS4ES) [1] project is to provide a solution that closes the current information, communication and cooperation gap between DERs and DSOs. To this end, the OS4ES project delivers an innovative Open Service System that enables dynamic DER-DSO cooperation and has future potential for new businesses. A Distributed Registry for DER systems offers involved actors the opportunity to reserve the aggregated flexibility of DER systems (even forming dynamic Virtual Power Plants) as a grid management service in order to improve Smart Grid robustness and reliability. OS4ES will be based on standardized and interoperable communication interfaces, as well as generic interfaces among components producing, consuming or storing electrical energy.

Applying innovative IT modelling methods to low-level grid information for DSO operations

Distribution system operators will gather an increasing amount of electricity data from the lower level of the grid to be able to cope with several challenges, such as an increase of distributed, heterogeneous energy production, local storage, and electric vehicles. Most DSOs are not yet prepared for collecting, storing and processing these large amounts of data. This paper introduces a method for designing, validating and implementing such a system. The most important aspect of this method is the fact that the domain expert is able to validate the constructed conceptual model, before it is used to create a working system. This validation step adds to the quality of the model, and therefore to the resulting system. We have applied our method to a use case where a DSO researcher wants to answer questions such as “Can we recognize which appliances are present in households?” and “How can we cluster similar households?”.

Market Optimization of a Cluster of DG-RES, Micro-CHP, Heat Pumps and Energy Storage within Network Constraints: The PowerMatching City Field Test

The share of renewable energy resources for electricity production, in a distributed setting (DG-RES), increases. The amount of energy transported via the electricity grid by substitution of fossil fuels for mobility applications (electric vehicles) and domestic heating (heat pumps) increases as well. Apart from the volume of electricity also the simultaneity factor increases at all grid levels. This poses unprecedented challenges to capacity management of the electricity infra-structure. A solution for tackling this challenge is using more active distribution networks, intelligent coordination of supply and demand using ICT and using the gas distribution network to mitigate electricity distribution bottlenecks.