Unit scheduling considering the flexibility of intelligent temperature control appliances under TOU power price

Abstract

With the continuous increase in the proportion of electricity used by commercial and residential customers and the popularity of intelligent appliances, demand response has become an important resource in improving the flexibility of the power system operation. This study focuses on exploiting the demand-side flexibility resources in unit scheduling. First, an energy management model (EMM) is established for intelligent temperature control appliances (ITCAs) of commercial and residential customers which can optimize its electricity consumption according to power prices under the smart grid, and the calculation model on the price elasticity of demand (PED) of the ITCA is built on the EMM through the mathematical derivation, by which the calculation method of ITCAs’ flexibility is proposed, namely, the PED of the ITCA is obtain with the consideration of appliance operation characteristics and customer's electricity consumption behaviors. Subsequently, taking the time-of-use (TOU) power price into account, a flexibility calculation method for ITCAs is proposed. Then, a unit scheduling model considering the flexibility of ITCAs is established in order to explore the influence of TOU power price on the power system operation. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method and model is verified in the IEEE-RTS79 system and a practical case in Zhangjiakou, China, respectively. The simulation results show that the proposed model can quantify the flexibility of ITCAs driven by electricity price signals and analyze the impact of the flexible response of ITCAs induced by TOU power price on the operation of the power system.