Demand Response in Block of Buildings

Project Information

DR-BOB

Grant agreement ID: 696114

DOI

10.3030/696114

Project closed

EC signature date 4 February 2016

Start date 1 March 2016

End date 31 August 2019

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Secure, clean and efficient energy

Total cost

€ 5 136 769,50

EU contribution

€ 4 274 499,50

Coordinated by

TEESSIDE UNIVERSITY
United Kingdom

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - DR-BOB (Demand Response in Block of Buildings)

Reporting period: 2017-09-01 to 2019-08-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The aim of the DR-BOB project is to demonstrate the economic and environmental benefits of demand response in blocks of buildings for the different key actors required to bring it to market. Demand response is becoming increasing important for our society as the electricity demand continues to rise due to increasing number of electrical appliances and electric vehicles. Furthermore, such demand is experiencing ever higher levels of peak consumption, with the expected increase in differences between peak and off-peak demand in the following years. DR-BOB offers a solution to this problem aiming to achieve the following objectives:
- Integrate existing technologies to form the DR-BOB Demand Response Energy Management solution for blocks-of-buildings with a potential ROI of 5 years or less.
- Demonstrate the DR-BOB integrated solution at 4 sites operating under different energy market and climatic conditions in the UK, France, Italy and Romania with blocks-of-buildings covering a total of 274,665 m2, a total of 47,600 occupants over a period of at least 12 months.
- Realise up to 11% saving in energy demand, up to 35% saving in electricity demand and a 30% reduction in the difference between peak power demand and minimum night time demand for building owners and facilities managers at the demonstration.
- Provide and validate a method of assessing at least 3 levels of technology readiness (1-no capability, 2-some capability, 3-full capability) related to the technologies required for consumers’ facilities managers, buildings and the local energy infrastructure to participate in the Demand Response Energy Management solution at any given site.
- Identify revenue sources with at least a 5% profit margin to underpin business models for each of the different types of stakeholders required to bring demand response in the blocks-of-buildings to market in different local and national contexts.
- Engage with at least 2,000 companies involved in the supply chain for demand response in blocks of buildings across the EU to disseminate the projects goals and findings.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

During the project, DR-BOB delivered 25 reports and achieved 12 milestones. The integration between the existing technologies: DEMS® (Siemens), Local Energy Manager (Teesside University), Consumer Portal (EcoTroks™ by Grid Pocket) was implemented at 4 pilot sites (in Romania, Italy, France and UK). The demonstration buildings allowed control and monitoring of their performance during the demand response (DR) events over a 12 month long demonstration period. The buildings covered 169,276 m2 of gross internal area and involved 28,295 occupants (conservative estimate), implementing between 3 and 5 DR scenarios per site. The scenarios were based on existing DR schemes and opportunities in the 4 countries hosting the project pilots. Evaluation of the achieved results revealed up to 23% reduction in electricity and energy demand and up to 37.5% reduction in the difference between peak and minimum night time demand. Four DR-BoB technology readiness levels (DRTRLs) have been defined to participate in the DR energy management solution at any given site. Furthermore, the DR-BOB solution is not limited to DR, but enables additional revenue channels such as predictive building management and data-driven energy saving. Two business models targeting aggregators and blocks-of-building owners were developed. The cost-benefit analysis showed a positive business case for buildings that meet the minimum technical requirements for supporting the DR-BOB solution. When only automated DR events are used, ROIs between 120% and 400% can be achieved over a 10-year project duration, i.e. the calculated payback time amounted to 2-5 years of operation. The project engaged with over 1900 companies as a result of more than 100 dissemination actions. It had an active website including its public deliverables, and periodically updated news and events sections. Project dissemination activities resulted in 13 conference, 7 journal and 1 book publications. The project was additionally presented at several high profile events, e.g. BULD-UP webinar, IEA workshop on the Role of Energy Efficiency in Europe’s Flexibility Agenda, European Utility Week, EPBD-CA workshop on Smart buildings for a greener Europe: Emerging Policy and Practice, Exploratory Workshop on Smart Metering-based Innovation and the Measurement of Building Performance, by the UK Government, and 2016 Energy Efficiency Information Day, by European Commission.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

DR-BOB integrated solution represents a clear progress beyond the state of the art as it provides unique local demand response energy management capabilities including optimised use of local renewable energy sources and storage based on actual vs. predicted demand, and signals from (implicit or explicit) demand response markets. It includes a local energy manager, market emulator platform and consumer portal which all communicate to the cloud based virtual energy plant.
Potential impacts of the project are:
- Demand response implemented at the level of blocks of buildings without unreasonable effort and complexity.
The solution was demonstrated at 4 pilot sites: Teesside University campus in Middlesbrough (UK), Fondazione Poliambulanza hospital complex in Brescia (Italy), Montaury business/technology park in Anglet (France) and Technical University of Cluj-Napoca buildings in Cluj-Napoca (Romania). In total, the implementation included 17 assets/buildings. Implementation activities also included installation of additional monitoring equipment to improve the DR technology readiness level of each building. Calculated payback time amounted to 2-5 years of operation.
- Added value of installing demand response facilities for building blocks and on the willingness of consumers to participate in demand response.
To demonstrate the added value of blocks of buildings, the scenarios defined as part of the project included several DR programs involving assets belonging to more buildings within the same block. Five generic scenarios were defined and tailored to specific technical and market conditions for different pilot sites. Each pilot site included at least three scenarios in which building occupants were engaged in DR activities. Over 20,000 occupants participated in realisation of DR scenarios. The implementation and running of the scenarios was followed by a qualitative assessment indicating the willingness of consumers to participate in DR on a regular basis.
- Measured energy and cost savings.
Energy and cost savings resulting from the DR-BOB solution were measured in each pilot site, amounting up to 23% reduction in electricity and energy demand and up to 37.5% reduction in the difference between peak and minimum night time demand.
- Willingness and capability of consumers to participate in demand response solutions.
DR-BOB introduced and demonstrated application of 4 levels of technology readiness for consumers’ buildings and local energy infrastructure to participate in demand response.
- Environmental and social impacts.
DR-BOB is contributes to EU targets of 40% emission reduction and 27% share of renewable energy sources by 2030. During this time DR-BOB solution could capture up to 600MW DR market, and create up to 1.2 million jobs. Such estimates are based on documented EU DR potential for commercial buildings estimated at 38 GW till 2030 (COWI, 2016).

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