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Coping with Variability Demand Flexibility, Micro-CHP and the Informated Grid

Coping with Variability Demand Flexibility, Micro-CHP and the Informated Grid. Dr Bob Everett Open University EERU. The privatised UK electricity industry has concentrated on the mass production and distribution of electricity

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Coping with Variability Demand Flexibility, Micro-CHP and the Informated Grid

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  1. Coping with VariabilityDemand Flexibility, Micro-CHP and the Informated Grid Dr Bob Everett Open University EERU

  2. The privatised UK electricity industry has concentrated on the mass production and distribution of electricity • Perhaps it should be looking more at how the energy service requirements of their customers; illumination, warm homes and refrigeration can be made more flexible to help cope with variability of supply

  3. If variability and two-shifting is such a problem, why don’t we get rid of some of it by promoting off-peak heating? - as the French did in the 1970s and 80s….

  4. Problem 1: The wind blows for a bit and then stops.. What are the problems of the variability of wind power? …and then starts again

  5. But it isn’t totally random... In this data set there is a slight daily cyclic variation and another of approximately 5.5 days

  6. Problem 2: It may be possible to predict accurately the strength of approaching winds in a weather front, but not exactly when it will arrive plus or minus an hour

  7. So we’d like: • Some long term demand flexibility of the order of several days • Lots of short term demand flexibility of around an hour What’s on offer?

  8. During the 1999 solar eclipse UK electricity demand fell by 2.2 GW in 20 minutes - just because lots of people found something better to do than work Picture: National Grid

  9. This A++ rated freezer will keep your food frozen for 64 hours after a mains interruption - alas its only rated at 115 watts Picture: Miele

  10. In my home I have water heating using an off-peak water heater with a 3 kW element. I don’t care exactly when it is heated up as long as I get a hot bath in the morning

  11. My fridge is rated at 150 watts and cycles approximately once every three-quarters of an hour. I’m sure that it could be delayed by 30 minutes without any problems • The company Dynamic Demand has been promoting the use of fridges in conjunction with mains frequency sensors, essentially to carry out the standing reserve function of ‘frequency service’

  12. This report argues that it makes no sense to sell electricity without a parallel flow of information about its use - we need a proper ‘informated grid’ • If it can be put in place then new ways of buying and selling electricity will arise

  13. Domestic metering is stuck in a bygone age We have advanced only slightly from this mid-Victorian (gas) meter

  14. This is my home electricity meter (installed 1997) A spinning disk meter (invented circa 1890) with a radio controlled tariff time switch. Even this does not actually control when my immersion heater comes on - that’s controlled by a timeclock set by me.

  15. There have been UK studies on the problems of metering, for example net metering of domestic PV, but there is an unwillingness to pay for the necessary complex meters.So - how will we get to an ‘informated grid’?

  16. A new factor - Domestic Micro CHP Philips Stirling Engine 200W generator 1950 Whispergen packaged 1.2 kW CHP 2004 Experimental 1kW CHP unit 1991

  17. In the early days of small scale (circa 100 kW) CHP in the 1980s equipment reliability was transformed by ‘informating’ it. • Modem links to the suppliers allowed on-line monitoring and fault diagnosis. Servicing and rapid repairs could be carried out before problems became serious, expensive and embarrasing.

  18. The market potential for domestic micro-CHP units is reckoned to be in the millions. This represents at least a gigawatt of generation capacity • Will this be the first domestic plant to be ‘informated’? • On-line monitoring could give increased reliability and consumer confidence and allow the design to be pushed to higher efficiencies Picture: Whispergen

  19. Once the information link is there then there is no reason why domestic CHP plant and other domestic devices such as fridges should not be remotely and flexibly controlled • This just leaves the questions: • ‘Who will do the controlling?’ • ‘How will they interface with the current market structure?

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