Development of an intelligent energy demand response program for a Brazilian free consumer of energy

Due to the successive increase of the electricity bill in the last years for energy consumers, they have looked more closely to their consumption. Nowadays it is possible to notice that many consumers have been looking for ways to reduce their consumption or the value of their electricity bill. Such a cost reduction is obtained mainly by means of own generation, distributed generation, investment in electrical efficiency, migration to the open market, or intelligent demand management. Within this context was developed a system (hardware and software) using National Instruments hardware and LabVIEW to make an intelligent demand management of a free consumer. The program looks optimize the financial results through the demand response concept taking advantage of the price difference in the spot market. A study was done for the ABC Federal University Campus — UFABC in Santo André Brazilian city looking for check the implemented system. Authors hope that the results obtained with this system can help companies and consulting firms in the decision-making process as they can eventually adopt the energy open market. Preliminary results indicate proper functioning of the system.