Application of Microgrids in Supporting Distribution Grid Flexibility

Distributed renewable energy resources have attracted significant attention in recent years due to the falling cost of the renewable energy technology, extensive federal and state incentives, and the application in improving load-point reliability. This growing proliferation, however, is changing the traditional consumption load curves by adding considerable levels of variability and further challenging the electricity supply-demand balance. In this paper, the application of microgrids in effectively capturing the distribution network net load variability, caused primarily by the prosumers, is investigated. Microgrids provide a viable and localized solution to this challenge, while removing the need for costly investments by the electric utility on reinforcing the existing electricity infrastructure. A flexibility-oriented microgrid optimal scheduling model is proposed and developed to coordinate the microgrid net load with the aggregated consumers/prosumers net load in the distribution network with a focus on ramping issues. The proposed coordination is performed to capture both inter- and intra-hour net load variabilities. Numerical simulations on a test distribution feeder with one microgrid and several consumers and prosumers exhibit the effectiveness of the proposed model.