Analysis on the potential of an energy aggregator for domestic users in the Italian electricity system

This study is focused on the definition of an energy aggregator model for domestic users, offering the Demand Response (DR) optimization and additional services. The research project is based on the Italian electricity system analysis pointing out the renewables high contribution, the poor domestic users’ electrification and the need to figure out those issues by a demand flexibility system implementation. Moreover, the characterization of Italian domestic users’ energy loads allowed to identify the suitable strategies to get higher flexibility degree. Thus, three case studies have been considered to assess the achievable economic savings due to the DR implementation, accounting for the revenue for dispatching services as well as the intraday energy price variations on the Italian market. It emerged that the demand side flexibility implementation offers benefits to the Italian electricity system but entails small economic benefits for the endusers. Additionally, the adoption of such a system is quite complicated due to the lack of suitable and reliable automation devices. For that reason, a potential energy aggregator for domestic users will have to search funds for its own operation providing customers with additional services, such as energy saving and assisted-living, by using of ICT along with automation within each dwelling.