Aggregation of flexible domestic heat pumps for the provision of reserve in power systems

The integration of renewable energy sources in the electricity production mix has an important impact on the management of the electricity grid, due to their intermittency. In particular, there is a rising need for flexibility, both on the supply and demand sides. This paper assesses the amount of flexibility that could be reserved from a set of flexible residential heat pumps in a given geographical area. It addresses the problem of a load aggregator controlling a set of heat pumps used to provide both space-heating and domestic hot water. The flexibility of the heat pumps is unlocked in order to reduce electricity procurement costs in the day-ahead electricity market, while ensuring the provision of a predefined amount of reserve for real-time grid management. The objective of the paper is two-fold. On the one hand, an aggregation method of large sets of heat pumps based on physics-based models and random sampling techniques is proposed. On the other hand, a combined optimization problem is formulated to determine both the optimal electricity demand profile to be bought on the day-ahead market and the cost associated to the reservation of a defined amount of power. The method is applied to a set of 40000 residential heat pumps in Belgian houses. Results show that these houses can provide up to 100MW of upward reserve for 50% of the current costs. The provision of downward reserve at competitive cost is hampered by significant overconsumption.