A virtual power plant simulator based on emergency generators considering the characteristics of island-mode operation

Abstract

One of the most effective ways to solve the problem of increasing demand for electricity and instability in the power supply is integrating distributed energy resources into a virtual power plant (VPP) which operates distributed energy resources as a power plants. The emergency generators among various distributed resources are the most appropriate generators which are installed in most buildings under the law and has tremendous potential for capacity. In operating schedules for an emergency generator-based VPP, the estimation of electric loads connected to an emergency generator is important because the loads determine the amount of power generation. In this paper, an emergency generator-based VPP simulator is developed using an agent-based approach. Each load connected to an emergency generator is modeled independently according to historical data from buildings to mimic real situations. Average load-based schedules and proposed model-based schedules are compared against each other, and the need for the proposed simulator is discussed. © 2016 International Information Institute.