Development of a Virtual Power Plant to Control Distributed Energy Resources for Future Smart Grid

Abstract:
The future of electricity power supply structures requires a power system that is adaptable to the dynamic change of the energy structure. The research presents a virtual power plant to control distributed energy resources (combined PV-BESSbiogas) using state-of-the-art information and communication technologies. It was modularly and upgradably built using a multi-agent system concept. Open source and free libraries/interfaces were applied as backbones of virtual power plant. Object linking and embedding for process control protocol manages communication and data exchange among power plants. An energy management and power plants characterizations were modelled in MATLAB-Simulink. The results show that a reliable and an adaptable power system for the future of the grid structure were achieved. Stakeholders were able to evaluate/to monitor power plants and to activate their participations in the electricity market. The client-server activities are ready to support primary frequency control with reduced respond times. To follow up this research, it is recommended to investigate power quality, virtual power plant security, and power plants ability to support ancillary services.