Volume 61

Coordinating and Reducing Peak Electrical Loads in Households: A Technical Benefit of Energy Communities Vartan Ahrens Kayayan

Abstract

Sweden has a low carbon emissions electricity production. However, peak electricity consumption challenges climate change mitigation and grid resilience. Energy communities could function as a framework to organize peak electricity power reduction. This paper addresses the dynamics of adding electricity demands and then capping the combined peak. This paper explores the number of apartments required to coordinate and how group size affects the electricity demand reduction across the population. A household electricity demand dataset of 558 apartments was applied to explore these questions in the Swedish context. The results show that at least 62 apartments are required to be grouped to make an effective reduction of the total peak. This paper demonstrates that efforts to reduce peak electrical power consumption in residential areas should be coordinated with several households to be effective.

Keywords energy community, energy system, peak electrical power, power efficiency, peak shaving