Secure, Clean, and Efficient Energy is one of the great societal challenges of our time. Electricity as a sustainable energy carrier plays a central role in the most effective transition scenarios toward sustainability. To harness this potential, the current electricity infrastructure needs to be rigorously re-engineered into an integrated and intelligent electricity system: the smart grid. Key elements of the smart grid vision are the coordination mechanisms. In such a system, vast numbers of devices, currently just passively connected to the grid, will become actively involved in system-wide and local coordination tasks. In this light, transactive energy (TE ) is emerging as a strong contender for orchestrating the coordinated operation of so many devices.

The future renewable-based power system will have an increased need for balancing power. Prosumers, having both generation and consumption capabilities, are expected to provide balancing power to the grid, if their flexibility can be appropriately managed. Meanwhile, undesirable line congestion and voltage violations may arise in the distribution network, when flexible resources respond to external control or price signals on a large scale. Hence, the development of an effective framework to coordinate flexibility at the distribution system level is of utmost importance. Such a framework should allow for an optimal provision of prosumer balancing power services within the boundaries of local network security constraints. In this study, a balancing market participation framework is proposed, adopting the concept of network-constrained transactive energy, to facilitate the interactions between the transmission system operator and aggregators who manage prosumer energy profiles. This framework retains user privacy and complies with the current market setup, where flexible energy is traded on the spot and balancing markets; however, it is ensured that the resulting energy profiles do not cause problems in the distribution network.

The increasing number of distributed energy resources connected to power systems raises operational challenges for the network operator, such as introducing grid congestion and voltage deviations in the distribution network level, as well as increasing balancing needs at the whole system level. Control and coordination of a large number of distributed energy assets requires innovative approaches. Transactive control has received much attention due to its decentralized decision-making and transparent characteristics. This paper introduces the concept and main features of transactive control, followed by a literature review and demonstration projects that apply to transactive control. Cases are then presented to illustrate the transactive control framework. At the end, discussions and research directions are presented, for applying transactive control to operating power systems, characterized by a high penetration of distributed energy resources.

Response of demand, distributed generation and electricity storage (e.g. vehicle to grid) will be crucial for power systems management in the future smart electricity grid. In this paper, we describe a smart grid technology that integrates demand and supply flexibility in the operation of the electricity system through the use of dynamic pricing. Over the last few years, this technology has been researched and developed into a market-ready system, and has been deployed in a number of successful field trials. Recent field experiences and simulation studies show the potential of the technology for network operations (e.g. congestion management and black-start support), for market operations (e.g. virtual power plant operations), and integration of large-scale wind power generation. The scalability of the technology, i.e. the ability to perform well under mass-application circumstances, has been proved in a targeted field experiment. This paper gives an overview of the results of two field trials and three simulation studies. In these trials and simulations, demand and supply response from real and simulated electrical vehicles, household appliances and heating systems (heat pumps and micro co-generation) has been successfully coordinated to reach specific smart grid goals.

Multi-agent technology is state of the art ICT. It is not yet widely applied in power control systems. However, it has a large potential for bottom-up, distributed control of RES and DER in future power systems. At least two major European R&D projects (MicroGrids and CRISP) have investigated its potential. Both grid-related as well as market related applications have been studied. This paper will focus on two field tests, performed in the Netherlands, applying multi-agent control by means of the PowerMatcher concept. In the PowerMatcher concept (http://www.powermatcher.net/) software agents are used as representatives of the power producing and/or consuming installations. Via market algorithms a strategy is determined to ensure, that their operational schemes are coordinated in order to balance supply and demand according to the business case. The algorithms in the PowerMatcher use a bottom-up electronic market mechanism. Building such a system, controlling primary user processes on one hand, assuring local autonomy, and operating on the electricity market on the other hand, appears to be feasible with mainstream ICT-components. We will describe and discuss a number of results from two field tests performed with the PowerMatcher concept, and discuss further developments.