Demand-side Management Policies Research Articles

Assessing urban water demand-side management policies before their implementation: An agent-based model approach

In the context of climate change and increasing water scarcity, adopting water demand-side management (DSM) policies has become necessary. This study advocates for utilizing agent-based modelling (ABM) as a robust simulation tool to assess the impact of nonprice (nudges) and price (changes in increasing block tariff) measures on urban water use. Overcoming challenges posed by insufficient high-quality data, the research integrates four sociocognitive profiles and diverse household income levels to reflect the variability in DSM policy effectiveness based on socioeconomic characteristics. Through 125 simulated scenarios combining various increasing block tariffs with nonpricing measures, the study reveals an average monthly demand reduction ranging from 8.1% to 15.6%. Significantly, nonprice measures prove more effective in curbing water use than pricing measures, attributed to the prioritization of environmental concerns in conservation efforts. Higher-income households exhibit less-pronounced reductions in water consumption. Emphasizing the reliability of ABM for ex ante evaluations of DSM policies, this research underscores the importance of a balanced approach, incorporating both nonprice and price-based measures, to effectively address water scarcity challenges.

A swarm-intelligent based load-shifting strategy for clean and economic microgrid operation

The required load in a typical microgrid structure fluctuates from hour to hour. Based on the peaks and troughs of the load demand curve, the power system utilities preset different price of electricity at various periods of the same day which is referred to as time-of-use (TOU) pricing policy. An optimal economic strategy called demand side management (DSM) reduces load during peak hours by shifting the elastic loads and compensates the shifted load by increasing the demand during valley hours. This recreates the total demand pattern on the demand price elasticity relation. The novel benefaction of this research suggests a DSM approach based on a hybrid intelligence technique to attain a compromised solution between minimum generation costs and pollutants emitted by DERs of an LV grid-connected microgrid system. Several grid involvement strategies, power market pricing types, and demand response mechanisms are examined in five separate instances for the microgrid system. The outcomes achieved in each example show that the recommended DSM technique may be applied and is appropriate in terms of cost reduction. When 30–40% of customers participated in the DSM curriculum, the generation cost was reduced by 10–13%. Environment constrained economic dispatch provided a superior compromise amongst lowest generation cost and emission for different microgrid load models. Statistical analysis and comparison of the results from previously published literatures validates the superiority of the proposed approach incorporated with DSM policy.

Household structure and electricity consumption in Ghana

Ghana has a rising residential electricity consumption of 47% of total generation while at the same time experiencing a worsening household age-dependency ratio considered to be above the global average. Using the most recent Ghana Living Standards Survey (2016/17 i.e., the seventh round), and employing logistic regression analyses, this paper examines how and the extent to which household age-dependency (0–14 and 64+) and other sociodemographic characteristics of Ghanaian households influences residential electricity consumption. In the face of worsening climate change partly attributable to high energy consumption, understanding the role household structure in residential electricity consumption across gender and location is critical in designing appropriate demand-side management policies. The results show that dependency ratio increases electricity consumption by approximately 12.4%. Furthermore, female-headed households with dependents tend to use less; or have reduced electricity usage compared to a male-headed household with dependents. The study recommends among others, the use of local government to spearhead education on energy efficiency especially at the household level and the establishment of green financing scheme for importers, manufacturers, and households.

Sustainable Production Scheduling with On-Site Intermittent Renewable Energy and Demand-Side Management: A Feed-Animal Case Study

By shifting towards renewable energy sources, manufacturing facilities can significantly reduce their carbon footprint. This environmental issue can be addressed by developing sustainable production through on-site renewable electricity generation and demand-side management policies. In this study, the energy required to power the manufacturing system is obtained from different energy sources: the conventional grid, on-site renewable energy, and an energy storage system. The main objective is to generate a production schedule for a flexible multi-process and multi-product manufacturing system that optimizes the utilization and procurement of electricity without affecting the final demand. A mathematical programming model is proposed to minimize both the total production costs and energy costs, considering a time-of-use pricing policy and an incentive-based program. The uncertainty in renewable energy generation, specifically under the worst-case scenario, is taken into account and the model is transformed into a robust two-stage optimization model. To solve this model, a decomposition approach based on a genetic algorithm is applied. The effectiveness of the proposed model and algorithm is tested on a real industry case involving feed-animal products. A sensitivity analysis is conducted by modifying problem parameters. Finally, a comparison with the nested Column and Constraint Generation algorithm is performed. The obtained results from these analyses validated the proposed model and algorithm.

How to make effective household water demand-side management policy in China? Evidence from survey data in 50 cities

The first-hand survey data from 7920 households spreading over 50 cities are used to study household adoption of technical water-saving measures (TWSMs) and behavioral water-saving measures (BWSMs) in China by employing binary probit and ordered probit models. Overall, there is a good water-saving practice in the public and about 89.4 % of households had adopted TWSMs or BWSMs in daily life. There are significant heterogeneous effects in gender, age, and living area: males are more likely to adopt TWSMs while females are much more prone to conduct higher use frequency of BWSMs; the older the household head, the lower likely to adopt TWSMs while the higher the usage frequency of BWSMs; southern households are more reluctant to conduct daily water-saving practices than their northern counterparts. The results confirm the effectiveness of existing three DSM policies in China. The heterogeneous preferences for TWSMs and BWSMs, lower adoption of water-saving practices in southern area, and non-price polices with low implementation costs need to be considered to better household water DSM in the future.

How to make sustainable water-saving policy based on public preferences in China? A conjoint analysis perspective

Scientific and effective demand-side management policies need to be based on practitioners' preferences to cope with the increasingly severe water shortage, but little attention has been paid to this topic. The paper studies public preferences for attributes of the 22 daily water-saving measures in the domestic sector in China by using conjoint analysis and unveils the heterogeneity in preferences by using variance analysis. The first-hand survey data and statistical analysis show that activities with large water-saving potential is less acceptable; the group with higher affordability has lower acceptance of technical water-saving measures; water-saving measures in public places with great water-saving potential are less acceptable than home measures. The gap between unveiled and socially desirable public preferences constitutes a pivotal barrier that need to be carefully considered in formulating scientific sustainable water-saving policies.

Operation of a Power Grid with Embedded Networked Microgrids and Onsite Renewable Technologies

The international community has set ambitious targets to replace the use of fossil fuels for electricity generation with renewable energy sources. The use of large-scale (e.g., solar farms) and small-scale solutions (e.g., onsite green technologies) represents one way to achieve these goals. This paper presents a mathematical optimization framework to coordinate the energy decisions between the distribution network and the networked microgrids embedded within it. Utility-scale renewable and conventional generators are considered in the distribution network, while the microgrids include onsite renewable generation and energy storage. The distribution network operator utilizes demand-side management policies to improve the network’s efficiency, and the microgrids operate under these programs by reducing their energy usage, scheduling the electricity usage under dynamic tariffs, and supplying energy to the grid. The uncertainty of renewable energy sources is addressed by robust optimization. The decisions of the distribution network and the microgrids are made independently, whereas the proposed collaboration scheme allows for the alignment of the systems’ objectives. A case study is analyzed to show the capability of the model to assess multiple configurations, eliminating the necessity of load shedding, and increasing the power supplied by the microgrids (22.3 MW) and the renewable energy share by up to 5.03%.

An analysis of the interactions between daily electricity demand levels in France

This research proposes a new system that classifies electricity demand in both levels and time periods and uses intraday data to provide a deeper understanding and inform the design of appropriate demand-side management measures. This classification divides the day into three periods with contrasting electricity demand levels; two with peaks, 6:15 a.m. to 5 p.m. and 5:15 p.m. to 11:45 p.m.; and one with a substantial drop in demand from 0 a.m. to 6 a.m.. The interactions of daily electricity demand levels in France from 2013 to 2021 were empirically analysed and revealed a need to implement demand-side management policies to shift demand from peak to valley periods.

Conserving for the common good: Preferences for water conservation policies during a severe drought in Northern California

During the 2011–2017 drought in California, water providers used a variety of demand-side management (DSM) policies to successfully reduce water consumption by over 20%. Unfortunately, because utilities used numerous conservation policies simultaneously, little is known about support for specific policies—specifically, an untested water-budgeting policy wherein utilities gave households an allotment of water and charged higher prices for water used in excess of the budget. California recently legislated mandatory long-term reductions in water usage. It is therefore critical to obtain a better understanding of which policies, including water budgeting, have strongest public support, and to understand how the drought experience changed residents' water use behaviors, attitudes, beliefs, habits, and personal capabilities surrounding conservation. This work surveyed individuals residing in northern California, the “North State,” during a period of severe drought. We used best-worst scaling to determine households’ preferences for DSM policies; asked households how their water use behaviors changed; and evaluated psychological attitudes toward drought and water conservation. Results show the vast majority of households changed their water use behaviors during the drought. Over two-thirds of respondents never exceeded their water budgets and said they would continue to conserve after the state lifted conservation requirements. Respondents preferred water budgets relative to more familiar DSM policies, a result with implications for forecasting future water demand. Last, our survey finds only minor differences in policy preferences for respondents with different demographics and attitudes toward water use, even for variables (e.g., income) that previous literature has found to have disparate welfare effects across users. • A majority of Californians changed their water-use behaviors during severe drought. • Northern California residents support using novel water budgets over voluntary conservation or watering restrictions. • Sociodemographic/psychological differences had little effect on conservation support.

Heat consumption scenarios in the rural residential sector: the potential of heat pump-based demand-side management for sustainable heating

BackgroundPoor air quality and inadequate domestic heating sources are tightly connected problems in the Eastern-European countryside. There are a few alternatives to comprehensively solve these problems with an emphasis on economic and environmental sustainability. In this paper, individual heat pumps and energy efficiency measures are analyzed in four scenarios to investigate their role for cleaner and sufficient heating in rural settings. From a high-level perspective, this paper assesses the potential for electricity demand flexibility based on the use of individual heat pumps equipped with hot water storage.MethodsIn a first step, the current annual residential heating energy consumption of a rural area in Hungary is estimated with a bottom-up model using data from field surveys and official datasets. In a second step, four scenarios estimate the future heating energy consumption considering demographic trends and the average number of building retrofits (thermal insulation) performed yearly in the region.ResultsThe reference scenario is a 20-year projection of heating energy consumption with modest retrofit actions which resulted in small energy savings. Alternative scenarios based on more effective retrofit actions reaching higher rates of the building stock would result in a 23–69% reduction in final energy consumption. Phasing out lignite from the heating energy mix would reduce particulate matter emissions. Each well-insulated dwelling with a heat pump-based system and hot water storage tank could provide theoretical flexibility of approximately 3.4 kWh per 24 h.ConclusionsThe current energy retrofit practices are not sufficient to solve the challenges faced in this area. Demand-side management policies based on the widespread use of individual heat pumps are an alternative to promote access to cleaner residential heating. An additional benefit is the potential for flexibility in electricity demand. Thus, this paper calls for an integration of energy retrofit with efficient heating (including hot water storage tank) to achieve results that further contribute to a future of sustainable energy.

Economic Issues in Deep Low-Carbon Energy Systems

The main interlinked challenges to achieve a low-carbon emission economy are analyzed. It is argued first that there are no obstacles to a free market working effectively with a high penetration of distributed Renewable Energies (RE), since intermittency has been overstated, and affordable storage solutions are available because of strong learning rates. Demand-side management policies are promising too, neither are there foreseeable boundaries to the availability of economically extractable photovoltaic and wind energies. A full 100% RE system may be more challenging though, partly because bioenergy, a key dispatchable source in most available RE roadmaps, clashes with growing food needs and reforestation to counter greenhouse gases emissions. Similarly, the green growth proposal is constrained by materials availability, mainly cobalt and phosphorus, which will also constrain the deployment of electric vehicles. Alternatively, the United Nations Human Development Index may be a more suitable target for a sustainable RE system. Although history is not reassuring, the main global economic hurdle is possibly existing fossil fuel-related investments, likely to become stranded. An assessment of their value yields a substantially lower figure than is sometimes claimed, though. Finally, a limited role for nuclear energy is assessed positively, provided it is publicly owned.

Clustering of electrical load patterns and time periods using uncertainty-based multi-level amplitude thresholding

This paper proposes a novel model to cluster similar load consumption patterns and identify time periods with similar consumption levels. The model represents the customer’s load pattern as an image and takes into account the load variation and uncertainty by using exponential intuitionistic fuzzy entropy. The advantage is that the proposed method can handle the uncertain nature of customer’s load, by adding a hesitation index to the membership and non-membership functions. A multi-level representation of the load patterns is then provided by creating specific bands for the load pattern amplitudes using intuitionistic fuzzy divergence-based thresholding. The typical load pattern is then determined for each customer. In order to reduce the number of features to represent each load pattern with respect to the time-domain data, the discrete wavelet transform is used to extract some spectral features. To cope with the data representation with fuzzy rules, the fuzzy c-means is implemented as the clustering algorithm. The proposed approach also identifies the time periods associated to different load pattern levels, providing useful hints for demand side management policies. The proposed method has been tested on ninety low voltage distribution grid customers, and its superior effectiveness with respect to the classical k-means algorithm has been represented by showing the better values obtained for a set of clustering validity indicators. The combination of load pattern clusters and time periods associated with the segmented load pattern amplitudes provides exploitable information for the efficient design and implementation of innovative energy services such as demand response for different customer categories.

Variation in Water Demand Responsiveness to Utility Policies and Weather: A Latent-Class Model

Water utilities use demand-side management (DSM) policies to incentivize conservation during shortages. However, because utilities often use DSM policies for the first time during drought, it may be difficult to determine the extent to which policy responsiveness relates to an overall conservation culture, and short-term policy responsiveness may not be generalizable to non-drought periods. This research evaluates the impact of drought and utility policies using 10 years of household-level panel data in the first known application of a fixed-effects, latent-class model [Deb, P and PK Trivedi (2013). Finite mixture for panels with fixed effects. Journal of Econometric Methods, 2(1), 35–51] to water demand data. This flexible estimation approach identifies heterogeneity in policy responsiveness over time as it relates to drought conditions and changes in the utility’s billing structure. Two classes of water demand are identified — one associated with responsiveness to weather and a second with responsiveness to policies. In the class of water demand associated with weather, households are less sensitive to policy changes but exhibit increased sensitivity to precipitation both when the utility is actively promoting conservation (during severe drought) and in post-drought years. Implications for long-term effectiveness of utility conservation policies are discussed.

Demand side management opportunities, framework, and implications for sustainable development in resource-rich countries: Case study Qatar

Abstract Over the last decades, global consumption of energy and environmental resources have been rapidly increasing due to advances in the production and transportation of goods, as well as reduced barriers to global trade markets. This trend raised sustainable consumption issues because of inefficient and wasteful use of resources, especially in resource-rich countries with high purchasing power and subsidized tariffs offered to residents. It is also well-known that resources abundance tends to lower financial development and limit productivity growth and social development. On the other hand, there is a growing acceptance that supply-side policies need to be complemented by demand-side management to support sustainable cleaner production and remedy aforementioned adverse impacts. In this study, we present the results of an investigation on demand-side management (DSM) opportunities and a framework developed for Qatar as a representative of an emerging resource-rich countries and discuss implications for cleaner production. The rationale behind is that Qatar is a commodity-dependent developing country, who, during the last five years, has experienced a population growth of 35%, and an increase in electricity and water demand of 46% and 35%, respectively. Similarly, during the same period, the national vehicle fleet has grown by more than twofold. These figures have ranked Qatar at the top of the per-capita energy, carbon, and water consumption list in the world and increased environmental vulnerability and reduced climate resilience. To that end, the objectives of this study are to: (1) construct a DSM framework tailored to the needs of resource-rich country like Qatar from economic, social, environmental, and technical aspects; (2) present, analyze, and discuss the results of a survey that reveals the perceptions, attitudes, and responses of local residents towards the applicability of DSM policies; and (3) discuss methods and solutions to achieve cleaner energy consumption. The conducted survey covered electricity, water, and transportation sectors and showed that residents have low awareness about their consumption habits, but they have high willingness to reduce their consumption levels. In the last section, we present the survey results and discussions as a reference for policy-makers to promote the most promising DSM options in Qatar. To the best of authors' knowledge, this is the first survey-based study conducted in the Gulf Cooperation Council region where a significant portion of world's oil and natural gas resources are extracted. Therefore, the results could provide insights to other resource-rich countries with similar characteristics to devise more efficient policies for promoting welfare-enhancing and sustainable consumption behavior.

Multi-process production scheduling with variable renewable integration and demand response

Integrating renewable energy sources to power manufacturing facilities is one approach to achieve low carbon economy. The contribution of this paper is to propose a way to facilitate and assess renewable sources’ integration into manufacturing systems, by exploring an optimization model that obtains a production schedule adapted to match the onsite renewable energy supply, with energy storage systems and the power grid as backups. A multi-process production scheme as well as demand side management policies such as Time-and-Level-of-Use and power consumption reduction requests are considered. To capture renewable uncertainties, a two-stage robust optimization model is formulated to optimize the production scheduling under the worst-case scenario of renewable generation. A nested Column-and-Constraint Generation algorithm is applied to solve this formulation. Numerical experiments are performed on a benchmark case, and sensitivity analysis is conducted by modifying renewable integration, uncertainty, data granularity, scheduling horizon, switch of on-peak prices hours, and zero-inventory policy. Obtained results validate the proposed model and algorithm.

Energy Revolution and the Energy Demand Side Management in China

China’s energy revolution has put forward new requirements for energy demand side management. For a long time, China’s energy demand side management lacks legalized and institutionalized policy and legal guarantee, which inhibits the role of energy demand side management in promoting sustainable economic and social development and energy structure transformation and upgrading. Based on the analysis of the status of China’s energy demand side management policies and laws and the existing problems such as low level of legislation, poor operability and focusing on power demand side management, suggestions on the legislation of China’s energy demand side management are put forward.

Industry, flexibility, and demand response: Applying German energy transition lessons in Chile

Demand side management (DSM) contributes, among its other purposes, to provide stability and flexibility to energy systems that include a high proportion of variable renewable energy in pioneer countries and those which recently began their energy transition. Among DSM policies, implementation of measures and mechanisms for a demand response (DR) is not a trivial matter. This study presents a review and comparative analysis of the major energy policy developments in Germany and Chile. Based on i) the relevance of the industry sector in both countries, ii) the difficulty in implementing the regulatory framework and iii) the importance given to the industrial customers in the German legislation and DR literature, the following analysis will focus on both medium and large industrial customers. The goals are to review the challenges in untying the full DR potential of the productive industry and to provide recommendations for the promotion of DR in Chile. Emphasis is placed on the lessons learned in fitting the wide potential of DR in the German electricity markets. A review of the successes and failures of the German experience reveals the potential risk that poor policy implementation can have in both the short and long term.

European Union legislation for demand-side management and public policies for demand response

Energy is now intrinsically linked to technological and social development, powering all such systems. The use of fossil fuels to supply the required energy is causing global environmental and health issues and is impacting on all life forms on the planet. Given the increasing energy use, anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are consequentially increasing. A critical and evolutionary way of thinking about the energy and resources demand management and supply is necessary because there is a clear concern about irreversible impacts on the world and a scarcity of the resources as well. At the same time, all the energy and resource use processes should be optimized to maximize the benefits, reduce the costs and promote stakeholders network, toward a circular economy. This could be the way to supply the demand without increasing the scarcity of the resources and to simultaneously achieve environmental benefits. At the same time, creating an educational grid is important to change the established paradigms, to promote critical thinking about the wasted resources and thinking holistically about overall consumption. This paradigm shift is changing the market, making it more competitive and reducing inefficiency by promoting the efficient use of resources. In the XXI century, legislation and public policies which consider sustainability approaches are constantly improving, trying to fix the pathways to avoid climate changes and achieve energy efficiency, but at the same time, the energy and resources demand still increasing to a no sustainable way to the social and environmental aspects.

The economic impact of electricity losses

Although electricity losses constitute an important, but inevitable, amount of wasted resources (and a portion that has to be funded), they remain one of the lesser known components of an electricity system, and this despite the fact that the decisions of generators, transmission and distribution system operators and consumers all impact on them. In this paper we analyse the effects of such losses from two perspectives: from that of consumption and from that of generation.Given that end-user consumption varies across the day, consumption has direct implications for electricity losses. Indeed, demand-side management policies seek to encourage consumers to use less energy during peak hours and to reduce network congestion. At the same time, from the perspective of generation, the recent growth in distributed generation has modified the traditional, unidirectional, downward flows in electricity systems. This affects losses as energy is produced in the lower voltage network, which is closer to points of consumption.In this paper we evaluate the impact of consumption patterns and different generation technologies on the energy losses and the cost of losses. To do so, we draw on data from a real electricity system with a high level of renewable penetration, namely, that of Spain between 2011 and 2013. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper to analyse the real impact of consumption and the effect of each generation technology on energy losses, offering an opportunity to evaluate the potential benefits of demand-side management policies and distributed generation. Losses are divided between transmission and distribution levels, which is also a novelty that allows us to better define our regulatory recommendations aimed at exploiting to the full these potential benefits. Our results should serve as a baseline for countries at the early stages of implementing these policies.

Demand-side policy: Global evidence base and implementation patterns

Demand-side management (DSM) policy refers to government policies for managing energy consumption in order to meet environmental and energy security objectives. The broader term of demand-side management encompasses energy efficiency, demand response and on-site generation and storage. A comprehensive meta-evaluation of the global evidence base for demand-side policy is lacking in the literature, and this paper contributes to filling this research gap. The paper focuses on the quality of the evidence base and policy implementation patterns and identifies 30 countries and 36 sub-national states across six continents that have implemented demand-side management policies and produced high-quality ex-post evaluations of those policies. The 690 high-quality evaluations are primarily conducted by industry rather than by governments or academia. The results show that 12 types of individual demand-side management policy and 9 demand-side management policy packages have been implemented and evaluated, and that carbon emissions reduction is the primary driver for demand-side management policies. The evidence base is greatest in the USA, the UK, California, France and China, and alternative utility business models (such as performance targets and decoupling policies), information campaigns, loans and subsidies, utility obligations and performance standards are the most commonly implemented and evaluated policies. This paper argues that demand-side policy will play an increasingly important role as a complement to low carbon activities on the supply-side in the transition to a more environmentally sustainable energy system.