From home energy management systems to communities energy managers: The use of an intelligent aggregator in a community in Algarve, Portugal

Abstract

This paper describes the development of community energy management systems (CEMS). A CEMS allows optimal energy sharing within energy communities, as it is a central system that makes the global management of the entire community. The proposed CEMS is based on mixed-integer linear programming (MILP), operating under the receding horizon concept of Model Predictive Control (MPC). A systematic classification of electric appliances, the use of external information such as weather information and energy prices, as well as the use of intelligent forecasting techniques enables the proposed approach to achieve an excellent efficiency. It also allows for an easy installation of as well as a smooth scaling with an increasing number of houses. The system is tested in a real community in Algarve, Portugal. Different simulations are compared to experimental operation and include cases with and without sharing of energy, different resources allocated to the houses considered, and the use of different tariffs. CEMS formulations include sharing of energy without restriction, as well as employing different allocation coefficients strategies. The results show that for the community under study when managed by CEMS such as the one presented in this paper, it would result in significant cost reductions when compared to the case where there is no energy community.