An autonomous decentralized control mechanism for power flow in an open electric energy network

Abstract

This paper discusses a power flow control mechanism for the “open electric energy network” (OEEN), which has been studied by the authors as a demand-side network suitable for a free market of electricity. The important concept of OEEN is that electric energy is treated like a packet of mail, with information about the sender (power producer) and the receiver (consumer). The control mechanism discussed in this paper is called the electric energy router and includes an energy storage device. The electric energy router controls the storage device in such a way that the “electricity packet” reaches a specified consumer from a specified power producer autonomously and in the distributed manner. This paper shows that optimal control theory can be applied to determine the control action of the electric energy router. The obtained optimal control action minimizes the difference between the load pattern of the consumer and the supply pattern of the router under the inequality constraints of energy storage capacity. A numerical example is given in order to check the validity of optimal control theory application. In order to manufacture a small-scale electric energy router for experiments, its basic structure and power control performance are studied through simulation studies. © 1998 Scripta Technica. Electr Eng Jpn, 121(4): 28–37, 1997