Engineering Information Systems for Integrated Energy Communities

Keeping global warming below 1.5 °C requires a decarbonization of the energy sectors heat and electricity, driven by investments in residential energy technologies (e.g., photovoltaic (PV) and thermal power plants, energy storage and heat pumps). One way to assist citizens in this process is through the development and application of information systems (IS). Furthermore, a regulatory element to support household investments in residential energy technologies is the establishment of a Citizen Energy Community (CEC) concept in Germany. CECs allow participants to buy or sell excess renewable generation directly within the community.
In the first part of the thesis, a decision support tool for household investments in residential energy technologies is developed that considers individual cost and emission preferences. In a second study, the acceptance of such IS is evaluated in a laboratory experiment with 324 participants.
To provide preference-based investment recommendations to households, it is necessary to determine the optimal investment alternative with respect to these preferences, which is addressed in the second part of the thesis. ... mehrFirst, a multi-objective optimization for the integrated design and simulation of residential energy technologies in CECs is developed with respect to the sectors heat and electricity. A set of non-dominated investment alternatives is derived for a hypothetical energy community in southern Germany. The implementation of CEC regulation has an impact on the application of residential energy technologies and potential cost and emission reductions, which is investigated in a subsequent study. Household decisions to install and operate residential energy technologies in a community are simulated over a 10-year period. The effects of CEC regulation are evaluated through several community scenarios consisting of different combinations of individuals with high, low, and heterogeneous sustainability preferences. The results show that CEC regulation is beneficial in all scenarios.
In the third part of the thesis, two examples of operation strategies for sector coupling technologies are presented. In the first study, the financial benefits of PV/thermal power plants combined with an absorption chiller to simultaneously provide electricity, heat, and cooling are compared to a system with PV and conventional cooling. Since uncertainty leads to operational inefficiencies, the second study combines heat load forecasting with a 24-hour online optimization of a heat pump and heat storage control strategy.