Profit Evaluation for Virtual Power Plant in Power Load Response: From the Perspective of Power Grid

Virtual power plant (VPP) is a new generation of intelligent control technology and interactive model integrating power resources, power network and power load in power system. Based on advanced modern information and communication technologies, VPP can efficiently integrate and manage distributed power resources, flexible power load, energy storage and other assets under its control. However, the construction of VPP requires certain investment in equipment transformation, technology upgrade, etc. Scientific calculation for VPP potential benefits is therefore helpful to VPP development. Among existing VPP profit evaluation methods, however, most approaches focus on VPP internal cost and its whole life expense, while the influence from the power grid side is normally ignored. Without considering the power grid demand and constraints, the economic value brought by VPP operation cannot be comprehensively assessed. In this work, a method for assessing VPP revenue in participating into load response from the power grid perspective is proposed. It considers the load response percentage, annual load data, and incentive prices, and can reasonably evaluate VPP benefits providing load demand response. A simulation case presents the application of this method. In addition, the calculation is simple and convenient, thus provide an effective means for comprehensively evaluating VPP benefits.