Pricing Schemes for Demand Side Management in Microgrids

Abstract

Electricity generation encompasses both conventional and non-conventional energy sources. Conventional procedures produce detrimental gas emissions, but non-conventional methods are ecologically sustainable. The present necessity is to prioritize non-conventional methods because of their sustainability. The existing fixed pricing schemes, especially for microgrid (MG) demand response (DR), require a more adaptive strategy to meet the changing energy environment. This study seeks to enhance the profitability of load users, irrespective of their flexibility, by applying a dynamic pricing scheme for DR in microgrids (MGs). The concept integrates renewable energy resources well with the main grid. The particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm has been utilized to address the DR optimization problem. A comparative examination of the proposed dynamic and fixed pricing schemes has been performed. MATLAB simulations demonstrate that the dynamic pricing scheme yields higher profitability for flexible and inflexible load users than the fixed pricing scheme.