According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), global electricity demand is projected to increase around 4% annually through 2027. Utilities have the responsibility to account for this changing electricity demand and maintain a reliable, resilient and safe grid. The U.S. Department of Energy reports that controlling distributed energy resources (DERs) can efficiently serve rising electricity demand while providing clean, affordable power. DER assets include grid-scale solar and battery installations and grid-edge assets located behind the meter, such as smart thermostats. To leverage the full power of DERs, utilities employ distributed energy resource management systems (DERMS) at two levels: Grid DERMS for overall asset orchestration of both utility-scale assets and management of Grid-Edge DERMS systems for behind-the-meter DERs, creating a comprehensive path to maximum energy efficiency.

Integrated Strategies: Grid DERMS & Grid-Edge DERMS

The robust adoption and proliferation of distributed energy resources (DERs) like solar, battery energy storage systems, electric vehicles (EVs) and their chargers and smart devices like thermostats and water heaters, provide load-shifting potential through aggregate device control. Through the use of a distributed energy resource management system (DERMS), utilities can aggregate these assets for use in demand flexibility initiatives like demand response, EV managed charging and virtual power plants.

For utilities, these DER assets represent an opportunity for load flexibility. To maximize that potential, both Grid and Grid-Edge DERMS are necessary to create the holistic ecosystem of decentralized energy assets, both utility-held and the behind-the-meter assets at the edge of the grid, necessary to manage that rising demand.

That’s why AspenTech Digital Grid Management (DGM) and Virtual Peaker have partnered to integrate Grid and Grid-Edge DERMS into one streamlined solution. Our AspenTech DGM-Virtual Peaker integrated solution enables comprehensive program capabilities of behind-the-meter DERs through Virtual Peaker’s Grid-Edge DERMS with a real-time integration for grid operation requests from the AspenTech OSI monarch platform, performing as an enterprise system for comprehensive DER management across utility stakeholders. Our joint solution allows utilities to more fully incorporate behind-the-meter resources into real-time network operations through AspenTech OSI DERMS, which provides a single, comprehensive user interface for utility users. The combination of full network awareness, advanced optimization and control, and situational awareness of the AspenTech OSI DERMS with Virtual Peaker’s BTM control, customer enrollment and flexible device groupings from their Grid-Edge DERMS provides a complete solution from inside your home to your largest utility-owned assets.

Innovation Requires Infrastructure

Legislation like the US Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act have gone a long way to upgrading the million-mile patchwork of the U.S. grid. Still, those solutions are expensive and take time to develop. That’s why accessing DER technologies both at the grid level and at the grid’s edge remains so valuable. And that’s one more reason why AspenTech Digital Grid Management and Virtual Peaker are working together, to provide a comprehensive solution to load management.

The Future of Load Flexibility

Grid DERMS and Grid-Edge DERMS-enabled services are needed to manage rising demand. Already, utilities employ Grid DERMS to yield reliable, bankable outcomes. Still, these resources represent only a fraction of the available energy assets within any given service territory, namely the behind-the-meter DER assets found at the edge of the grid.

The AspenTech DGM-Virtual Peaker solution creates a common interface for comprehensive DER management including load and generation forecasting, planning, dispatching, and reporting. By leveraging both Virtual Peaker and AspenTech OSI Monarch Platform capabilities, utilities benefit from a single system that can overcome barriers within utilities and enable new capabilities such as Virtual Power Plants (VPP). Secure and fast APIs transfer data between systems, resulting in a simple-to-use, multi-functional, reliable tool that streamlines demand flexibility processes while optimizing DER assets to yield reliable results. Virtual Peaker works behind the meter to predict demand response performance and provide forecasted response to Aspen Tech DGM. Aspen Tech DGM forecasts load and generation across varying hierarchies of the distribution network and can identify the times and locations where a demand response event may be needed. Partnering together, Aspen Tech DGM can provide the specific devices needed to respond to an event based on real-time telemetry allowing Virtual Peaker to minimize the number of devices needed and bring a scalpel to a problem that historically has had an all or nothing level of response.

Conclusion

Grid and Grid-Edge DERMS represent complementary, integrated strategies that complete the ecosystem enabled through increased access to WiFi-enabled smart devices and prosumer technologies. AspenTech and Virtual Peaker's collaboration realizes this potential by providing a streamlined, efficient, all-in-one solution to manage every DER asset in a utility’s service territory.