Deployment and Experimental Evaluation of Micro-Grid Systems

Renewable energy sources (RES) have been promoted to overcome environmental constraints as well as the scarcity of fossil energy sources. In fact, many initiatives have been deployed by integrating these sources (e.g. Photovoltaic panel, Wind, Fuel cell...) in order to increase energy efficiency (i.e., electricity production) in buildings while limiting CO2 emissions. In parallel to this development, micro-grids have emerged as decentralized systems to allow connecting different decentralized sources in which buildings become active electricity producers in addition to the main traditional electric grid. However, a smarter demand response management system is required to efficiently balancing the energy production, storage, and the electricity consumption. In this paper, a demand/response control approach is introduced by integrating into a holistic platform different RES together with storage devices for supplying electricity to buildings equipment (e.g. ventilation system, lighting…). A prototype was developed and deployed in our EEBLab for experiments and real-testing. Preliminary experimental results are reported and show the usefulness of the proposed holistic approach.