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SECTOR SPOTLIGHT
December 2015/January 2016 | industrial automation asia
Pat Herman
ARTICLE TAG Power Plants, Infrastructure, Software
A NEW GENERATION OF VIRTUAL POWER PLANTS
THIS ARTICLE AIMS TO ANSWER THE FOLLOWING KEY QUESTIONS: HOW IS THE ELECTRICITY ENERGY MARKET TRANSFORMING, HOW ARE VPPS CHANGING TO MEET THE OPPORTUNITIES ENABLED BY THESE TRANSFORMATIONS, AND WHICH SUPPLIERS OF NEXT-GENERATION VPP SOLUTIONS ARE BEST PLACED TO MEET THE VARYING NEEDS OF THE MARKET? BY EMIL BERTHELSEN, PRINCIPAL ANALYST AT MACHINA RESEARCH 1. Transformation Is A Necessity For The Energy Sector The world demand for energy is growing: according to the US Energy Information Administration, world energy consumption is set to increase by 56 percent between 2010 and 2040. The energy market is in a state of flux. Residential users are increasingly generating their own energy and looking to sell power back to the grid, public and private organisations are looking to manage their energy demand more Got a Question? Make An Enquiry. intelligently, ENQUIRY NUMBER and there is an anticipated massive spike in demand Turn to page 72a to enquire or log on to: imminent from
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the growth of electric vehicles. The grid is moving from being a unidirectional network of energy supply from the centralised power stations to the end users, to a significantly more complex and multidirectional network of energy balancing which can only be addressed with connected energy management solutions. Four technology vectors are transforming the energy market: •
Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) — The adoption of renewable and alternative energy resources has grown significantly in recent years, driven by falling equipment prices and government subsidies. These distributed and intermittent energy resources
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will require integration into a wider grid infrastructure. As well as changing production, this has also changed the way that energy is consumed, with the growth of ‘prosumers’: both producers and consumers of energy. In conjunction with the increasing penetration of smart meters and the emergence of microgrids, innovative energy consumption and production models will emerge in localised areas, such as the SmartCity Rheintal initiative. Demand Response (DR) — Traditionally the energy market has been demand driven, and supplies had to match that demand. Future demand is predicted to substantially