Reduce current peaks and energy consumption

[bartbutenaers]

Hi,
Thanks for sharing this mind-blowing library!!

At this stage I am just reading through the docs, to figure out if I can handle all my energey related stuff with it. For example in Belgium the electricity bill for a digital meter contains two parts:

• The peak current cost
• The energy consumption cost

So first of all I need to try to minimize my peak, by not scheduling high loads at the same time. Secondly I need to lower my consumption, e.g. by using energy from a battery or whatever. I am by far an expert in this area, but I "think" that I need the following two features to accomplish this:

• An object function that minimizes peak consumption.
• The ability to activate multiple object functions, and apply a weight to each one.

Is my assumption correct, or am I somehow completely mistaken?

I also see a feature request about capacity tariff but not sure if that is the solution to my problem.

It would be nice if somebody could illuminate me...

Thanks!!
Bart

[scruysberghs]

Hey Bart. emhass supports limiting peak demand out of the box through the max_power_from_grid parameter
Also no need to work with weights for different resources, emhass uses an mpc optimiser to do the planning.

[bartbutenaers]

Hi @scruysberghs,

Thanks for the fast and helpfull feedback (from Belgium 😄)!

Ok that is good news already. Then EMHass will most probably the way to go for me.

Just out of curiosity, it would be appreciated if you could explain a bit more in detail how it works, to support my old brain:

• Am I correct that the max_power_from_grid is a constraint in that case?
• How is such an mpc optimiser an alternative for using weights to reach different targets?

[scruysberghs]

We indeed use max_power_from_grid as a configurable constraint (comfort level) that comes with a cost (~5€ per kw over 2.5kw per month):

With mpc you just say for example, the boiler needs 6kwh per day before 19u, I want my car battery 80% full by tomorrow 7:00, and keep the ground floor at 22°C all the time and emhass/mpc I will plan those, taking dynamic pricing and solar forecast into account together with battery (dis)charging and solar curtailment to get you the lowest cost over the next x hours (your mpc horizon). No need for rule based priorities/weights.

[bartbutenaers]

Very clear. Thanks a lot!!

[snauwaertc]

While this will limit the max consumption, this may not be the optimal solution. Not sure if it's worth the development time, but here's a feature request to include the capacity cost in the goal function:
#540