Optimized residential load scheduling under user defined constraints in a real-time tariff paradigm

Peak demand is a one of the major problems in an electricity grid and it has been solved by supply side management in the past. But nowadays the existence of potential in the demand side management has drawn attention due to its economic and environmental advantages. In this paper, the potential of demand response in reducing the peak load demands as well as electricity bills to the domestic electricity users is evaluated. For this purpose, domestic appliances are modeled in MATLAB Simulink and controlled by the energy management controller. The devices are categorized into controllable or uncontrollable. Energy management controller decides the switching instants of the controllable appliances based on the results from optimization algorithms. MILP (mixed integer linear programming) algorithm is used for optimization in GAMS software. In different cases, different constraints are used for optimization considering the comforts, needs and priorities of the end users. Results are compared and the savings in electricity bills is discussed in this paper considering real time pricing and fixed tariff pricing, which exhibits the existence of potential to reduce electricity bills and peak loads in demand side management.