Use of Model Predictive Control for Short-Term Operating Reserve Using Commercial Buildings in the United Kingdom Context

Abstract

Flexibility, particularly in terms of reserve services, is an essential requirement of power systems with high penetration of renewable electrical generation, which can reduce undesirable curtailment and enable higher integration of clean electrical power from renewable generation. Reserve services are related to additional active power sources available to the grid operator in the form of either increased generation or demand reduction. There is increasing evidence that commercial buildings can provide such reserves. In this paper we present a Model Predictive Control approach to optimization of flexibility afforded by commercial buildings for the provision of reserve services, in particular for Short-Term Operating Reserve from the National Grid in the United Kingdom. This reserve scheme is only required during selected hours of the day and involves turning down consumption for a few hours at the request of the National Grid with a slow response time (≤ 5 minutes). Commercial buildings equipped with heat pumps and backup gas boilers are considered. The proposed robust Model Predictive Control framework enables commercial buildings to provide Short-Term Operating Reserve without compromising the comfort of the occupants. Simulation are performed with a high-fidelity building model derived from Energy Plus through the software OpenBuild including real market data. Results show that a commercial building can provide Short-Term Operating Reserve and yield an economic benefit in a robust manner, without violating the indoor comfort of occupants. CONFIDENTIAL. Limited circulation. For review only.

Robust Optimal Control for Demand Side Management of Multi-Carrier Microgrids

“…In the last years, many works have considered applications of MPC to microgrids [12], [14]- [27]. These works devote their attention either to multi-carrier microgrids [12], [16]- [22], to fully thermal microgrids [15], or to fully electrical microgrids [14], [23]- [27]. The article [14] presents a modeling framework for electrical microgrid energy management systems.…”

“…Similarly, paper [15] presents a thermal microgrid modeling framework and a Det-MPC approach, considering district heating, thermal energy storage, and flexible loads. MPC algorithms for multi-carrier microgrids have been proposed in [12], [16]- [19], [22]. The article [16] discusses a stochastic MPC approach for microgrids that contain both thermal and electrical units.…”

“…With respect to RMPC, some applications to microgrids have been considered [12], [22]- [26]. The authors of [23] present a min-max RMPC approach for fuel-cell cars inside a microgrid.…”

“…Such a method provides a trade-off between robustness and conservatism of the controller. In [12], an RMPC approach for multi-carrier microgrids is considered, with a focus on a demand response program of the United Kingdom national grid. The goal of such a program is to add some extra flexibility to the energy grid and make the supply of energy more secure; the prosumer that provides flexibility is rewarded economically for the commitment to supply energy.…”

“…Conversely, when a small amount of information is available on the disturbances, an RMPC approach is the most suitable choice. This also applies to cases in which it is necessary to guarantee at all times a maximum amount of power exchanged with the main grid [12]. In addition, the robust approach has significantly higher computational performance and the corresponding uncertainty modeling is simpler than the stochastic approach [13].…”