Special Session Introduction

The worldwide increasing energy demand and environmental concerns define the compelling need of energy system decentralization and evolution in the role of terminal customers from passive consumers to active prosumers. The local energy communities concept refers to a set of energy users deciding to make operation choices to satisfy their energy need and to maximize the benefits deriving from this collegial approach. This ongoing energy transition offers advantages including reduced need of transmission infrastructures, reduced power losses, and a higher share of zero-carbon electricity. Introducing novel techniques and mechanisms for modeling, operation optimization, and architecture design for local energy communities is of great significance in promoting distributed energy integration and deployment, and active involvement of individual consumers to achieve common goals in energy security, energy equity, and environmental sustainability

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Technical Outline of the Session:

This special session focuses on the emerging research topic -Modeling, operation, and market mechanism design for local energy communities. With the increasing penetration levels of the distributed renewable energy resources, the centralized energy system is continuously being transformed into a decentralized, renewable, volatile, uncertain, and complex one. During the transition pathway, the local energy community plays an important role since it enables deployment of sustainable energy technologies and customer engagement, bringing various benefits to community users and contributing to the overall energy and climate targets. The concept of local energy community responds on the needs of local communes and settlements for a sustainable energy supply. The goal is to combine new innovative technologies with locally available natural resources, and to raise awareness of energy efficiency and possibilities to use the renewable energy based on the model of local cycle economy. Novel techniques and theories in related area are encouraged in this special session. Topics of interest include (but are not limit to): types and market frameworks of local energy communities, modeling of local energy community, operation optimization of the distributed energy sources in the local energy community, mechanism and architecture design for local energy market, etc.

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Special Session Organizers

Xiaorong Sun, Lecture, Hohai University

Dr. Xiaorong Sun received B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Hohai University, Nanjing, China, in 2010, and her M.S and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA, in 2014 and 2017, respectively. She was a Power System Engineer in R&D Department at GE Renewable Energy, Seattle, WA, USA from 2017 to 2020. Currently, she is a lecture with the College of Energy and Electrical Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing, China. Her research interests include planning and operation of power system, integrated energy system, electricity market, energy forecasting, etc.

Yaowen Yu, Associate Professor, Huazhong University of Science and Technology

Dr. Yaowen Yu received the B.S. degree in automation from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, China, in 2011, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA, in 2014 and 2016, respectively. He was a Senior Application Engineer at ABB Enterprise Software, San Jose, CA, USA, from 2016 to 2019. Currently, he is an associate professor at the School of Artificial Intelligence and Automation, HUST. His research interests include mixed-integer programming, machine learning, blockchain, and their applications in electricity markets and integrated energy systems