Flexibility in Multi-Energy Communities With Electrical and Thermal Storage: A Stochastic, Robust Approach for Multi-Service Demand Response

There is increasing interest in multi-energy communities, which could become important sources of demand response flexibility, especially when equipped with storage. Their location on distribution networks mean their exploitation to solve local capacity congestions may be particularly valuable, whilst their ability to partake in energy/reserve markets can improve their business cases. However, maximizing this flexibility potential by providing multiple services that are subject to uncertain calls is a challenging modeling task. To address this, we present a stochastic energy/reserve mixed integer linear program for a community energy system with consideration of local network constraints. By covering all the relevant energy vectors, the multi-energy formulation allows comprehensive modeling of different flexibility options, namely, multi-energy storage, energy vector substitution, end-service curtailment, and power factor manipulation. A key feature of the approach is its robustness against any reserve call, ensuring that occupant thermal comfort cannot be degraded beyond agreed limits in the event of a call. The approach is demonstrated through a case study that illustrates how the different flexibility options can be used to integrate more electric heat pumps into a capacity constrained smart district that is managed as a community energy system, while maximizing its revenues from multiple markets/services.