Smart grid and intelligent office buildings: virtual power plants: the basis for the optimal use of renewable energy sources

Electricity energy generation and its supply through electricity networks are mainly organized in a top-down, centralized manner. Energy consumption can be predicted quite accurately at a high level, and this forms the basis for prescheduling the production by large power plants. Only few actors are involved in the generation, trade, and transportation of electricity, but this is changing rapidly. The increasing share of decentralized renewable energy conversion in combination with the new types of consumers will drastically alter the operation of electricity systems. Office buildings will become a potential source of energy flexibility which can be offered to the grid as a virtual power plant (VPP). In order to minimize uncertainty in the balance between energy supply and demand, it is necessary to develop realistic user behavior, installations behavior, and smart grid interaction. Monitoring the needs and preferences of users is necessary to predict future states of the demand for the smart energy systems (SES; e.g., based on weather forecasts and user behavior). The consumer of energy can become a producer due to the decentralized renewable energy conversion. To control this dynamic and interactive process automated prosumer support is needed to optimize interaction between offices and the smart grid. The chapter describes the first steps towards such systems.