Managing residential demand uncertainty in a smart grid-interactive hydrokinetic river system

The aim of this paper is to provide an integrated optimization and control algorithm in order to solve the residential load demand uncertainty problem as encountered in a grid-interactive hydrokinetic river (GHR) system. The proposed GHR system is incorporated with a pumped hydro-storage system (PHS) to store excess energy. The proposed algorithm aims to resolve the load demand uncertainty in order to minimize the electricity bills of the consumer and to maximize the energy sales into the grid, under time-of-use (TOU) tariff scheme. Therefore, the maximization of load demand satisfaction is not compromised. The traditional open loop optimization approach cannot cater for load demand uncertainty. It becomes more challenging to adequately meet the uncertain load demand. Within this context, the rule-based control algorithm is developed to manage power flow during uncertain load demand. The obtained results demonstrated that the load demand is adequately met at a reduced grid consumption cost, through the application of the rule-based control algorithm. This confirmed that the proposed algorithm benefits the user, by reliably and economically satisfying the load demand at a minimal grid energy cost.