Optimal real-time integration control of a virtual power plant

This paper presents an optimal, real-time integration control mechanism for interconnecting hybrid energy sources into a virtual power plant. The implemented virtual power plant consists of distributed energy sources including ten solar panels providing 1 MW aggregate power, six wind turbines generating 9 MW aggregate power, and ten grid connected battery energy storage systems which support the overall grid. Importantly, the capacity, the availability and the uninterrupted operation of the virtual power plant were identified as metrics to evaluate the real-time integration of distributed energy sources into the virtual power plant. Furthermore, optimization techniques were developed using mixed integer linear programming in CPLEX (IBM ILOG optimization studio) to identify the optimal real-time operating margins for the aggregate virtual power plant. Using the optimal real-time integration control mechanism, the capacity factor of the virtual power plant was improved by 45 %, the system unavailability was reduced by 5.3 %, and the system interruption was reduced by 65.47 %, while the duration of the interruption decreased by 13 minutes per day as compared to non-optimal integration control strategies. The obtained results demonstrate that the optimal real-time integration control mechanism yields a more functional and reliable integration control of the virtual power plant, and thus increases the economic feasibility of distributed energy resources in the energy market.