Flexibility Valorization in Energy Communities: Grid Constraints Impact and Mitigation

This paper investigates the impact of flexibility valorization of prosumers organized as an energy community on local grid constraints. In particular, the work focuses on market flexibility valorization, particularly upward flexibility service, using capacity and energy reservations. Moreover, a two-stage community operation strategy is proposed in order to: (i) collectively gather prosumers’ flexibility, (ii) optimize the energy exchange among the community members, and (iii) mitigate grid constraints violations during the actual operation. The proposed strategy is evaluated on a distribution grid of six prosumers with four energy storage systems as the flexible assets. The results highlights how the proposed operation strategy is able to adapt with flexibility activation request from the market. A comparison study is also performed, which highlights the effectiveness of the proposed method to mitigate grid constraints violations compared to the considered base scenario.