A Smart Building Energy Management and Pricing System with Renewable Energy Resources

Abstract

Renewable Energy Resources (RES) has become mature enough to be integrated into commercial buildings. Even though this integration brings many opportunities; one must decide how to price electrical energy in case of a peer-to-peer (P2P) mechanism is enabled, and utilize the RES in an efficient way, e.g. avoiding grid interaction. This paper proposes a virtual aggregator (VA) for a building that has a shared RES system, thus enabling an internal trading environment for its users. The algorithm also considers load shifting capabilities of such devices, and fair pricing of the excess energy. The load shifting process takes advantage of the results of P2P trade as well. First, the energy distribution between P2P trade participants is handled. Subsequently, home appliances with shifting capabilities are taken into account and priced accordingly. Finally, the system performance is evaluated considering load shifting scenarios and different VA parameters.