SPLODER (Smart Planning and Operation of Distributed Energy Resources (DER)) is an economic and technical system for efficient DER adoption and real time operation at household, city, microgrid or system level, developed at IIT (Institute for Research in Technology)
There are several versions of the SPLODER system that can make long term analyses, and operate in real time the energy resources distributed in the power grid:
- SPLODER-HOME or SPLODER-BUILDING: this is the core of the SPLODER system, since all the other versions use it. It is focused to buildings, apartments, households, shops, offices, … The aim of this version is to optimizes the thermal and electric energy in a building (renewables, storage, air conditioning, DHW, lighting, appliances, so on), supports price and power signals, and takes into account user preferences (illumination and temperature). Furthermore, it has a thermal building model, which is fitted in real time. As external services, it also can include customer behavior forecasting, economic and energy savings estimation, energy efficiency suggestions, detection of abnormal energy consumptions, powerful customer engagement and real time estimation of customer preferences. Thanks to this version, customers can reduce their energy bill, can be engaged in the energy efficiency issues, improve their comfort and reduce the environmental impact.
- SPLODER-AMS: this version was developed for retailers who want to become aggregators. It optimizes the bids in energy markets (price maker) aggregating the behavior of the different distributed electric and thermal resources of different customers (distributed storage, CHP, electric vehicle, PV panels, geothermal and so on), and sends optimal price signals to customers. As a result, this version improves the profit of retailers, allows reducing customers’ energy bill, and reduces the environmental impact.
- SPLODER-MICROGRID: this system was developed for a microgrid operator. It optimizes the thermal and electric energy in a microgrid (auxiliary generators, distributed storage, CHP, EV, distributed solar energy, geothermal, thermal collectors, micro wind turbines, ...) and determine the exchange energy price in the microgrid in each hour (even under imperfect competition between agents). The analyses that could be carried out with this tool could be: to determine the synergies between thermal and electric energy, to determine the optimum investments in DER in a microgrid, to know if it is profitable to operate in isolated mode, to know what happens if some customers have a monopoly with the microgrid generation sources.
- SPLODER-SYSTEM: this version was developed for regulatory analyses and to support the strategic decisions of utilities. It optimizes the investments in a system with centralized and distributed generation (nuclear power, combine cycle gas turbine, hydraulic, wind turbine, concentrated solar, distributed storage, CHP, distributed solar, ...), taking into account the power grid, and determines the network tariff.
