Energy management problem in dwellings: Combining centralized and distributed solving approaches

The global dwelling energy management problem can be formalized as an optimization problem of energy consumption/ production. An optimal solution for the home energy management problem is usually solved by centralized solvers. The solver gets the totality of the thermal model of the dwelling but also each appliance composing the system. Nevertheless, this centralized resolution has some limits due to some particular appliances. For example: the appliances with a non-sharable model because of the manufacturer, the appliances that need some precisions that cannot be included in their standard representation used by the solver, the appliances which require specific solvers and the appliances that are managed by user-defined specific heuristic rules. This work proposes to combine the centralized solving approach for energy management problem in dwellings with a multi-agent solving system. The multi agent system provides the possibility of integrating specific models in the global solving of the problem. The proposed system is a mixed centralized/decentralized approach for the solving of global energy management problem. In this paper we present the system and the results of the perfamance tests realized. This work is part of the ANR project ReActivHome.