FlexOffers: Unified generalized modelling and management of flexibility in electricity demand and supply

This page summarizes open resources underlying the FlexOffer technology.

Overview

In collaboration with partners, AAU-Daisy has developed a universal unified way to represent / model flexibilities in energy consumption and production, and this generalized model is called a “FlexOffer”. This concept and the underlying technology have been developed in a number of EU FP7, H2020 and Danish Innovation Fund projects. Below, we provide references to these projects, as well as the key artifacts, summarizing the main findings and contribution.

To get an overview, we suggest the following references and the reading order: P19, R1, S1, P9, R3, R2.

Projects

MIRABEL (2010-2013) - developed a scalable ICT system for (1) Higher RES integration; (2) Demand-supply balancing; (3) FlexOffer management
TOTALFLEX (2012-2016)– developed and demonstrated a market-based system for flexibility trading and congestion management
Arrowhead (2013-2017)– it’s the largest European automation project of all time; It focuses on collaborative automation and interoperability of networked devices in (1) production, (2) end-user services, (3) smart buildings and infrastructure, (4) electro-mobility, and (5) markets of energy.
DiCyps (2015-2021) – makes a fundamental research on how to utilize software and data for smarter solutions in heath, traffic, energy, and community service domains
GoFlex (2016-2019)- a Horizon 2020 project, which integrate and demonstrate a group of smart-grid technologies for the cost effective use of demand response in distribution grids
FED (2019-2023) - a Danish digitalization project aimed at turning Danish electricity consumption flexible to enable excess power production from wind turbines and solar cells.
FEVER (2020-2023) - H2020 project that aims at demonstrating and implementing solutions that leverage the potential of flexibility in generation, consumption and storage of electricity.
domOS (2020-2023) - H2020 project that designs an IoT system for buildings, and integrates it with smart energy services.

Key project reports

[R1] An overview of the FlexOffer concept, GOFLEX, 2018
[R2] The MIRABEL deliverable D7.5:MIRABEL-ONE: Initial draft of the MIRABEL Standard, 2011.
[R3] The TOTALFLEX final report, 2016.
[R4] domOS D3.3: FlexOffer Extensions for Predictions, Flexibility, and Uncertainty Modelling

Key papers

A number of papers and reports have been published on the topics related to FlexOffers since 2010. The most relevant ones are given below:

[P1] Matthias Böhm, Lars Dannecker, Andreas Doms, Erik Dovgan, Bogdan Filipic, Ulrike Fischer, Wolfgang Lehner, Torben Bach Pedersen, Yoann Pitarch, Laurynas Siksnys, Tea Tusar: Data management in the MIRABEL smart grid system.EDBT/ICDT Workshops 2012.
[P2] Ulrike Fischer, Dalia Kaulakiene, Mohamed Khalefa, Wolfgang Lehner, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Siksnys, Christian Thomsen: Real-Time Business Intelligence in the MIRABEL Smart Grid System, BIRTE, 2012
[P3] T. Tušar, L. Šikšnys, TB. Pedersen, E. Dovgan, B. Filipic: Using aggregation to improve the scheduling of flexible energy offers, Proc. of BIOMA, 2012.
[P4] Valsomatzis E., Hose K., Pedersen T.B.Balancing Energy Flexibilities Through Aggregation.In: Woon W., Aung Z., Madnick S. (eds) Data Analytics for Renewable Energy Integration. DARE 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8817.
[P5] Emmanouil Valsomatzis, Katja Hose, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, Measuring and Comparing Energy Flexibilities, 2015
[P6] L. Šikšnys, E. Valsomatzis, K. Hose and T. B. Pedersen, "Aggregating and Disaggregating Flexibility Objects," in IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, vol. 27, no. 11, pp. 2893-2906, 1 Nov. 2015.
[P7] Šikšnys L., Thomsen C., Pedersen T.B. MIRABEL DW: Managing Complex Energy Data in a Smart Grid. In: Hameurlain A., Küng J., Wagner R., Cuzzocrea A., Dayal U. (eds) Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems XXI, 2015.
[P8] Bijay Neupane, Torben Bach Pedersen, and Bo Thiesson. 2015. Evaluating the Value of Flexibility in Energy Regulation Markets. In Proceedings of the 2015 ACM Sixth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '15). ACM,NewYork,NY,USA,131-140.
[P9] Le Guilly, Thibaut; Siksnys, Laurynas; Albano, Michele; Pedersen, Per D.; Stluka, Petr; Ferreira, Luis Lino; Skou, Arne Joachim; Pedersen, Torben Bach; Olsen, Petur. An Energy Flexibility Framework on the Internet of Things.The Success of European Projects using New Information and Communication Technologies, 2016.
[P10] E. Valsomatzis, T. B. Pedersen, A. Abelló and K. Hose, "Aggregating energy flexibilities under constraints," 2016 IEEE International Conference on Smart Grid Communications (SmartGridComm), Sydney, NSW, 2016, pp. 484-490.
[P11] Bijay Neupane, Laurynas Šikšnys, and Torben Bach Pedersen. DeMand: A tool for evaluating and comparing device-level demand and supply forecast models, 2016,
[P12] Laurynas Šikšnys and Torben Bach Pedersen. 2016. Dependency-based FlexOffers: scalable management of flexible loads with dependencies. In Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '16). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Article 11.
[P13] Emmanouil Valsomatzis, Torben Bach Pedersen, Alberto Abelló, Katja Hose, and Laurynas Šikšnys. Towards constraint-based aggregation of energy flexibilities. In Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Future Energy Systems Poster Sessions (e-Energy '16). ACM, New York, NY, 2016.
[P14] Bijay Neupane, Laurynas Šikšnys, and Torben Bach Pedersen. Generation and Evaluation of Flex-Offers from Flexible Electrical Devices. In Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '17). ACM,NewYork,NY, USA, 143-156, 2017.
[P15] Chapter 7 of this book: Delsing, Jerker. IoT Automation: Arrowhead Framework (1st Edition). CRC Press. 2017.
[P16] Davide Frazzetto, Bijay Neupane, Torben Bach Pedersen, and Thomas Dyhre Nielsen. 2018. Adaptive User-Oriented Direct Load-Control of Residential Flexible Devices. In Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '18).
[P17] Bijay Neupane, Torben Bach Pedersen, and Bo Thiesson. Utilizing Device-level Demand Forecasting for Flexibility Markets. In Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '18). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 108-118, 2018.
[P18] Emmanouil Valsomatzis, Torben Bach Pedersen, and Alberto Abelló. Day-ahead Trading of Aggregated Energy Flexibility. In Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '18). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 134-138, 2018
[P19] Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, and Bijay Neupane, "Modeling and Managing Energy Flexibility Using FlexOffers," SmartGridComm, 2018.
[P20] Laurynas Šikšnys, Torben Bach Pedersen, Muhammad Aftab, and Bijay Neupane, "Flexibility Modeling, Management, and Trading in Bottom-up Cellular Energy Systems," In Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '19). ACM, Phoenix, AZ, USA, 170-180, 2019.
[P21] Fabio Lilliu, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, "Capturing Battery Flexibility in a General and Scalable Way Using the FlexOffer Model." In International Conference on Communications, Control, and Computing Technologies for Smart Grids (SmartGridComm 2021). Aachen, Germany, 64-70, 2021.
[P22] Jonas Brusokas, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, Dalin Zhang, Kaixuan Chen, "HeatFlex: Machine learning based data-driven flexibility prediction for individual heat pumps." In Proceedings of the Twelfth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '21). ACM, Torino, Italy, 160-170, 2021.
[P23] Bijay Neupane, Laurynas Šikšnys, Torben Bach Pedersen, Rikke Hagensby Jensen, Muhammad Aftab, Bradley Eck, Francesco Fusco, Robert Gormally, Mark Purcell, Seshu Tirupathi, Gregor Cerne, Sašo Brus, Ioannis Papageorgiou, Gerhard Meindl, Pierre Roduit, "GOFLEX: extracting, aggregating and trading flexibility based on FlexOffers for 500+ prosumers in 3 European cities [operational systems paper]." In Proceedings of the Thirteenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '22). ACM, online, 361-373, 2022.
[P24] Fabio Lilliu, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, Bijay Neupane, "Uncertain flexoffers, a scalable, uncertainty-aware model for energy flexibility." In Proceedings of the Thirteenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '22). ACM, online, 448-449, 2022.
[P25] Michele Albano, Nicola Cibin, Hessam Golmohamadi, Arne Skou, "Probabilistic Flexoffers in residential heat pumps considering uncertain weather forecast." In Proceedings of the Energy Informatics.Academy Conference 2022 (EI.A 2022). Velje, Denmark, vol.5, 2022.
[P26] Nicola Cibin, Alessandro Tibo, Hessam Golmohamadi, Arne Skou, Michele Albano, "Machine learning-based algorithms to estimate thermal dynamics of residential buildings with energy flexibility" In Journal of Building Engineering, vol.65, 2023.
[P27] Subina Khanal, Nguyen Ho, Torben Bach Pedersen, "FDA-HeatFlex: Scalable Privacy-Preserving Temperature and Flexibility Prediction for Heat Pumps using Federated Domain Adaptation." In Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '23). ACM, Orlando, Florida, USA, 172-183, 2023.
[P28] Fabio Lilliu, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, Bijay Neupane, "Uncertain flexoffers, a scalable, uncertainty-aware model for energy flexibility." In Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '23). ACM, Orlando, Florida, USA, 30-41, 2023.
[P29] Fabio Lilliu, Torben Bach Pedersen, Laurynas Šikšnys, "Heat FlexOffers: a device-independent and scalable representation of electricity-heat flexibility." In Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy '23). ACM, Orlando, Florida, USA, 374-385, 2023.

Key presentations

[S1] FlexOffer overview presentation, the EERA workshop, DTU, Copenhagen, 2016.

Key paper presentations

[N1] Battery FlexOffers (P21), SmartGridComm 2021
[N2] HeatFlex (P22), e-Energy '21
[N3] Probabilistic FlexOffers (P25), EI.A.'22
[N4] FDA-Heatflex (P27), e-Energy '23
[N5] Uncertain FlexOffers (P28), e-Energy '23
[N6] Heat FlexOffers (P29), e-Energy'23

Key posters

[T1] TOTALFLEX: A marketplace for flexibility, 2014
[T2] Demonstration of Virtual Energy Market : A SOA-based Approach, ArrowHead, Stavanger, 2015.
[T3] Uncertain FlexOffers poster, e-energy 2022.

Open source implementations

The Virtual Market of Energy (VME) implementation developed in the Arrowhead project
The SOLVEDB implementation, also used for FlexOffer optimization. More details here.
The GOFLEX FlexOffer Manager open-source implementation.
The GOFLEX FlexOffer Agent open-source implementation.
Practical basic FlexOffer examples in JSON.
The FED FlexOffer stack