Sharing Storage in a Smart Grid: A Coalitional Game Approach

Sharing economy is a transformative socio-economic phenomenon built around the idea of sharing underused resources and services, e.g., transportation and housing, thereby reducing costs and extracting value. Anticipating continued reduction in the cost of electricity storage, we look into the potential opportunity in electrical power system where consumers share storage with each other. We consider two different scenarios. In the first scenario, consumers are assumed to already have individual storage devices and they explore cooperation to minimize the realized electricity consumption cost. In the second scenario, a group of consumers is interested to invest in joint storage capacity and operate it cooperatively. The resulting system problems are modeled using cooperative game theory. In both cases, the cooperative games are shown to have non-empty cores and we develop efficient cost allocations in the core with analytical expressions. Thus, sharing of storage in cooperative manner is shown to be very effective for the electric power system

ENERGY & STORAGE SHARING STRATEGIES IN AN ELECTRICITY MARKET ENVIRONMENT

The rapid growth of renewable energy generation (REG) and energy storage systems (ESS) has created a need to further develop the electricity market for distributed energy, to stimulate the technology and application of REG and battery energy storage systems (BESS). Considering that the investment cost is still high at this stage, a window of opportunity exists for the development of a sharing economy. In light of this, this thesis focuses on energy and storage sharing strategies in an electricity market environment. A distributed energy sharing strategy is proposed for a peer-to-peer (P2P) model on a microgrid. In addition, the pricing model for users in this proposed strategy has been optimised using game theory—with the Bayesian Nash Equilibrium (GM-BNE) algorithm. Based on the basic call auction trading model, the energy trading mechanism has been modified. Meanwhile, an energy sharing cloud service is proposed based on a decentralised approach, in which the cloud energy management strategy can be customised for each participant. Rigorous proofs are also given. A detailed energy storage sharing strategy of the hybrid electricity and gas energy is proposed in the distribution network, which considers the energy operation of BESS and thermal energy storage system (TESS). The techno-economic analysis based on the BESS and TESS sizing model is conducted for storage sharing between users. When considering the battery firm in the joint storage sharing strategy, a novel sharing model is proposed based on the classic per-use sharing economy business model. Rigorous mathematical proofs are given for the application of the sharing economy model to BESS, in which the sharing pricing model is validated for technical feasibility and accuracy. The proposed energy and storage sharing strategies are applicable to distributed users, in the cases of the hospitality industry and smart home. The proposed sharing strategies are also beneficial for investors, as demonstrated in the case for a battery firm. In the case of the battery firm, this per-use rental service can open new benefits. The case studies results show that the proposed energy and storage sharing strategies provide a 'win-win' situation for customers, the battery sales firm and energy networks

Peer-to-Peer Sharing of Energy Storage Systems under Net Metering and Time-of-Use Pricing

Sharing economy has become a socio-economic trend in transportation and housing sectors. It develops business models leveraging underutilized resources. Like those sectors, power grid is also becoming smarter with many flexible resources, and researchers are investigating the impact of sharing resources here as well that can help to reduce cost and extract value. In this work, we investigate sharing of energy storage devices among individual households in a cooperative fashion. Coalitional game theory is used to model the scenario where utility company imposes time-of-use (ToU) price and net metering billing mechanism. The resulting game has a non-empty core and we can develop a cost allocation mechanism with easy to compute analytical formula. Allocation is fair and cost effective for every household. We design the price for peer to peer network (P2P) and an algorithm for sharing that keeps the grand coalition always stable. Thus sharing electricity of storage devices among consumers can be effective in this set-up. Our mechanism is implemented in a community of 80 households in Texas using real data of demand and solar irradiance and the results show significant cost savings for our method

Peer-to-peer and community-based markets: A comprehensive review

The advent of more proactive consumers, the so-called "prosumers", with production and storage capabilities, is empowering the consumers and bringing new opportunities and challenges to the operation of power systems in a market environment. Recently, a novel proposal for the design and operation of electricity markets has emerged: these so-called peer-to-peer (P2P) electricity markets conceptually allow the prosumers to directly share their electrical energy and investment. Such P2P markets rely on a consumer-centric and bottom-up perspective by giving the opportunity to consumers to freely choose the way they are to source their electric energy. A community can also be formed by prosumers who want to collaborate, or in terms of operational energy management. This paper contributes with an overview of these new P2P markets that starts with the motivation, challenges, market designs moving to the potential future developments in this field, providing recommendations while considering a test-case

The sustainable global energy economy: Hydrogen or silicon?

A sustainable global silicon energy economy is proposed as a potential alternative to the hydrogen economy. This first visualisation of a silicon energy economy is based on largescale and carbon-neutral metallic silicon production from major smelters in North Africa and elsewhere, supplied by desert silica sand and electricity from extensive solar generating systems. The resulting “fuel silicon” is shipped around the world to emission-free silicon power stations for either immediate electricity generation or stockpiling. The high energy density of silicon and its stable storage make it an ideal material for maintaining national economic functioning through security of base load power supply from a renewable source. This contrasts with the present situation of fossil fuel usage with its associated global warming and geopolitical supply uncertainties. Critical technological requirements for the silicon economy are carbon-neutral silicon production and the development of efficient silicon-fired power stations capable of high-temperature rapid oxidation of fuel silicon. A call is made for the development of research effort into these specific engineering issues, and also with respect to large-scale economical solar power generation

Transforming Energy Networks via Peer to Peer Energy Trading: Potential of Game Theoretic Approaches

Peer-to-peer (P2P) energy trading has emerged as a next-generation energy management mechanism for the smart grid that enables each prosumer of the network to participate in energy trading with one another and the grid. This poses a significant challenge in terms of modeling the decision-making process of each participant with conflicting interest and motivating prosumers to participate in energy trading and to cooperate, if necessary, for achieving different energy management goals. Therefore, such decision-making process needs to be built on solid mathematical and signal processing tools that can ensure an efficient operation of the smart grid. This paper provides an overview of the use of game theoretic approaches for P2P energy trading as a feasible and effective means of energy management. As such, we discuss various games and auction theoretic approaches by following a systematic classification to provide information on the importance of game theory for smart energy research. Then, the paper focuses on the P2P energy trading describing its key features and giving an introduction to an existing P2P testbed. Further, the paper zooms into the detail of some specific game and auction theoretic models that have recently been used in P2P energy trading and discusses some important finding of these schemes.Comment: 38 pages, single column, double spac

Long-term U.S transportation electricity use considering the effect of autonomous-vehicles: Estimates & policy observations

In this paper, we model three layers of transportation disruption – first electrification, then autonomy, and finally sharing and pooling – in order to project transportation electricity demand and greenhouse gas emissions in the United States to 2050. Using an expanded kaya identity framework, we model vehicle stock, energy intensity, and vehicle miles traveled, progressively considering the effects of each of these three disruptions. We find that electricity use from light duty vehicle transport will likely be in the 570–1140 TWh range, 13–26%, respectively, of total electricity demand in 2050. Depending on the pace at which the electric sector decarbonizes, this increase in electric demand could correspond to a decrease in LDV greenhouse gas emissions of up to 80%. In the near term, rapid and complete transport electrification with a carbon-free grid should remain the cornerstones of transport decarbonization policy. However, long-term policy should also aim to mitigate autonomous vehicles’ potential to increase driving mileage, urban and suburban sprawl, and traffic congestion while incentivizing potential energy efficiency improvements through both better system management and the lightweighting of an accident-free vehicle fleet