HEMS as network support tool: Facilitating network operator in congestion management and overvoltage mitigation

Rapid proliferation of the Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) is posing major operational challenges like congestions and voltage limit violations in the distribution networks. A number of direct and market-based control strategies are being widely developed to address these challenges. While the direct approaches aim to control the loads directly, the market-based control influences individual prosumers with price or incentive-based mechanisms. In this paper, a Multi-Agent System (MAS) based Home Energy Management System (HEMS) has been proposed to provide network support functionalities during congestions and overvoltage incidents. The proposed mechanism is comprised of a scalable market-based architecture and enhanced with an advanced power curtailment mechanism that curtails active power consumption of the residential electrical appliances and power injection of individual distributed generation (DG) units. The proposed HEMS model is simulated and verified with a case study for a typical Dutch house. To test the operation of the proposed HEMS, a Zigbee based lab prototype has also been developed.