AiD-EM: Adaptive Decision Support for Electricity Markets Negotiations

This paper presents the Adaptive Decision Support for Electricity Markets Negotiations (AiD-EM) system. AiD-EM is a multi-agent system that provides decision support to market players by incorporating multiple sub-(agent-based) systems, directed to the decision support of specific problems. These sub-systems make use of different artificial intelligence methodologies, such as machine learning and evolutionary computing, to enable players adaptation in the planning phase and in actual negotiations in auction-based markets and bilateral negotiations. AiD-EM demonstration is enabled by its connection to MASCEM (Multi-Agent Simulator of Competitive Electricity Markets).This work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under project DOMINOES (grant agreement No 771066) and from FEDER Funds through COMPETE program and from National Funds through FCT under the project UID/EEA/00760/2019info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Distributed learning of energy contracts negotiation strategies with collaborative reinforcement learning

The evolution of electricity markets towards local energy trading models, including peer-to-peer transactions, is bringing by multiple challenges for the involved players. In particular, small consumers, prosumers and generators, with no experience on participating in competitive energy markets, are not prepared for facing such an environment. This paper addresses this problem by proposing a decision support solution for small players negotiations in local transactions. The collaborative reinforcement learning concept is applied to combine different learning processes and reached an enhanced final decision for players actions in bilateral negotiations. The reinforcement learning process is based on the application of the Q-Learning algorithm; and the continuous combination of the different learning results applies and compares several collaborative learning algorithms, namely BEST-Q, Average (AVE)-Q; Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO)-Q, and Weighted Strategy Sharing (WSS)-Q and uses a model to aggregate these results. Results show that the collaborative learning process enables players' to correctly identify the negotiation strategy to apply in each moment, context and against each opponent.DOMINOES - Smart Distribution Grid: a Market Driven Approach for the Next Generation of Advanced Operation Models and Services (771066)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Contextual Q-Learning

This paper highlights a new learning model that introduces a contextual dimension to the well-known Q-Learning algorithm. Through the identification of different contexts, the learning process is adapted accordingly, thus converging to enhanced results. The proposed learning model includes a simulated annealing (SA) process that accelerates the convergence process. The model is integrated in a multi-agent decision support system for electricity market players negotiations, enabling the experimentation of results using real electricity market data.This work has received funding from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under project DOMINOES (grant agreement No 771066) and from FEDER Funds through COMPETE program and from National Funds through FCT under projects CEECIND/01811/2017 and UIDB/00760/2020N/

ALBidS: A Decision Support System for Strategic Bidding in Electricity Markets

This work demonstrates a system that provides decision support to players in electricity market negotiations. This contribution is provided by ALBidS (Adaptive Learning strategic Bidding System), a decision support system that includes a large number of distinct market negotiation strategies, and learns which should be used in each context in order to provide the best expected response. The learning process on the best negotiation strategies to use at each moment is developed by means of several integrated reinforcement learning algorithms. ALBidS is integrated with MASCEM (Multi-Agent Simulator of Competitive Electricity Markets), which enables the simulation of realistic market scenarios using real data.This work has been developed under the MAS-SOCIETY project - PTDC/EEI-EEE/28954/2017 and has received funding from UID/EEA/00760/2019, funded by FEDER Funds through COMPETE and by National Funds through FCT.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Classification of local energy trading negotiation profiles using artificial neural networks

Electricity markets are evolving into a local trading setting, which makes it for unexperienced players to achieve good agreements and obtain profits. One of the solutions to deal with this issue is to provide players with decision support solutions capable of identifying opponents' negotiation profiles, so that negotiation strategies can be adapted to those profiles in order to reach the best possible results from negotiations. This paper presents an approach that classifies opponents' proposals during a negotiation, to determine which is the typical negotiation profile in which the opponent most relates. The classification process is performed using an artificial neural network approach, and it is able to adapt at each new proposal during the negotiation process, by re-classifying the opponents' negotiation profile according to the most recent actions. In this way, effective decision support is provided to market players, enabling them to adapt the negotiation strategy throughout the negotiations.This work has received funding from National Funds through FCT (Fundaçao da Ciencia e Tecnologia) under the project SPET – 29165, call SAICT 2017info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Decision Support System for Opponents Selection in Electricity Markets Bilateral Negotiations

This paper presents a new multi-agent decision support system with the purpose of aiding bilateral contract negotiators in the pre-negotiation phase, through the analysis of their possible opponents. The application area of this system is the electricity market, in which players trade a certain volume of energy at a specified price. Consequently, the main output of this system is the recommendation of the best opponent(s) to trade with and the target energy volume to trade with each of the opponents. These recommendations are achieved through the analysis of the possible opponents’ past behavior, namely by learning on their past actions. The result is the forecasting of the expected prices against each opponent depending on the volume to trade. The expected prices are then used by a game-theory based model, to reach the final decision on the best opponents to negotiate with and the ideal target volume to be negotiated with each of themThis work has been developed under the MAS-SOCIETY project - PTDC/EEI-EEE/28954/2017 and has received funding from UID/EEA/00760/2019, funded by FEDER Funds through COMPETE and by National Funds through FCTinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Portfolio Optimization for Electricity Market Participation with NPSO-LRS

Massive changes in electricity markets have occurred during the last years, as a consequence of the massive introduction of renewable energies. These changes have led to a restructuring process that had an impact throughout the electrical industry. The case of the electricity markets is a relevant example, where new forms of trading emerged and new market entities were created. With these changes, the complexity of electricity markets increased as well, which brought out the need from the involved players for adequate support to their decision making process. Artificial intelligence plays an important role in the development of these tools. Multi-agent systems, in particular, have been largely explored by stakeholders in the sector. Artificial intelligence also provides intelligent solutions for optimization, which enable troubleshooting in a short time and with very similar results to those achieved by deterministic techniques, which usually result from very high execution times. The work presented in this paper aims at solving a portfolio optimization problem for electricity markets participation, using an approach based on NPSO-LRS (New Particle Swarm Optimization with Local Random Search). The proposed method is used to assist decisions of electricity market players.This work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 641794 (project DREAM-GO) and from FEDER Funds through COMPETE program and from National Funds through FCT under the project UID/EEA/00760/2013info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Fair Remuneration of Energy Consumption Flexibility Using Shapley Value

This paper proposes a new methodology for fair remuneration of consumers participation in demand response events. With the increasing penetration of renewable energy sources with a high variability; the flexibility from the consumers’ side becomes a crucial asset in power and energy systems. However, determining how to effectively remunerate consumers flexibility in a fair way is a challenging task. Current models tend to apply over-simplistic and non-realistic approaches which do not incentivize the participation of the required players. This paper proposes a novel methodology to remunerate consumers flexibility, in a fair way. The proposed model considers different aggregators, which manage the demand response requests within their coalition. After player provide their flexibility, the remuneration is calculated based on the flexibility amount provided by the players, the previous participation in demand response programs, the localization of the players, the type of consumer, the effort put in the provided flexibility amount, and the contribution to the stability of the coalition structure using the Shapley value. Results show that by assigning different weights to the distinct factors that compose the calculation formulation, players remuneration can be adapted to the needs and goals of both the players and the aggregators.This work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under project DOMINOES (grant agreement No 771066) and from FEDER Funds through COMPETE program and from National Funds through FCT under the project UID/EEA/00760/2019 and Ricardo Faia is supported by FCT Funds through and SFRH/BD/133086/2017 PhD scholarship.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Customized Normalization Method to Enhance the Clustering Process of Consumption Profiles

The restructuring of electricity markets brought many changes to markets operation. To overcome these new challenges, the study of electricity markets operation has been gaining an increasing importance.With the emergence of microgrids and smart grids, new business models able to cope with new opportunities are being developed. New types of players are also emerging, allowing aggregating a diversity of entities, e.g. generation, storage, electric vehicles, and consumers. The virtual power player (VPP) facilitates their participation in the electricity markets and provides a set of new services promoting generation and consumption efficiency, while improving players` benefits. The contribution of this paper is a customized normalization method that supports a clustering methodology for the remuneration and tariffs definition from VPPs. To implement fair and strategic remuneration and tariff methodologies, this model uses a clustering algorithm, applied on normalized load values, which creates sub-groups of data according to their correlations. The clustering process is evaluated so that the number of data sub-groups that brings the most added value for the decision making process is found, according to players characteristics. The proposed clustering methodology has been tested in a real distribution network with 30 bus, including residential and commercial consumers, photovoltaic generation and storage.The present work was done and funded in the scope of the following projects: People Programme of the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme FP7/2007-2013/ project ELECON, REA grant agreement No 318912; EUREKA - ITEA2 Project M2MGrids with project number 13011info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Practical Application of a Multi-Agent Systems Society for Energy Management and Control

Power and energy systems lack decision-support systems that enable studying big problems as a whole. The interoperability between multi-agent systems that address specific parts of the global problem is essential. Ontologies ease interoperability between heterogeneous systems providing semantic meaning to the information exchanged between the various parties. This paper presents the practical application of a society of multi-agent systems, which uses ontologies to enable the interoperability between different types of agent-based simulators, directed to the simulation and operation of electricity markets, smart grids and residential energy management. Real data-based demonstration shows the proposed approach advantages in enabling comprehensive, autonomous and intelligent power system simulation studies.This work has been developed under the MAS-SOCIETY project - PTDC/EEI-EEE/28954/2017 and has received funding from UID/EEA/00760/2019, funded by FEDER Funds through COMPETE and by National Funds through FCTinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio