Active participation of buildings in the power sector : the case of small office buildings

Abstract

Under the broad context of decarbonization of the energy sector, commercial buildings are well-suited for providing ancillary services to the electricity grid and poised to transform from passive consumers to active electricity market participants. A data-driven multi-zonal thermal response model is formulated and fit to EnergyPlus simulation data from a Department of Energy Small Office Reference Commercial Building for the months of June, July and August. When validated and tested against EnergyPlus simulation data, the thermal response model performs well. The thermal response model is then used in a co-optimization of energy and ancillary provision for a small office building with a variable air volume system from [9] using summer wholesale electricity and ancillary services prices from ISO-NE. Under six different price cases, the individual small office building provides maximum hourly regulation and spinning reserve capacities of 3.2 and 4.4 kW respectively and daily total regulation and spinning reserve capacities of 51 and 46 kW respectively. When scaled up over similar building stock in New England, small office buildings can provide up to 9.5% of ISO-NE's daily regulation requirement and 8% of the daily spinning reserves requirement. From an economic perspective, a small office building's potential summer ancillary services' revenues are not sufficient to drive investment in installation of a building automation system, variable air volume system and associated metering. However, buildings may invest in the necessary equipment for energy cost reductions and to participate in other demand response programs. Increasing building participation rates in ancillary services markets requires addressing the principal-agent problem, building-specific concerns such as program controllability and convenience and targeted policies aimed at increasing availability of clear aggregator-enabled building participation avenues.