Abstract By the directives of the European Union (EU), the Energy Community (EC) operates in the field of electricity production, distribution, supply, consumption management, aggregation, energy storage, provision of flexibility services, energy efficiency services, and charging services for electric vehicles. To achieve the above, it is necessary to clearly define the EC’s business models, technical design, and organizational structure. This paper will clarify the similarities and differences between the concepts of renewable energy communities and citizens’ energy communities through a comparative analysis. This paper provides an overview of the literature on ECs to create a picture of the current situation in this area. Likewise, the analysis of the literature gave a clear picture of who the possible members of the EC are, their mutual relations and the possible activities of the EC and the way of participating in the market. For an energy management system (EMS), the model of data exchange is given. This requires the exact mapping of EC within the SGAM, which includes communication and information standards. Also, the business models and functions of ECs are explained. For the selected use-cases, an analysis of the functionalities (activities) of the ECs is conducted.

Abstract This research investigates the technological underpinnings of Local Flexibility Markets (LFMs). It delves into the synergistic relationship between Information Technology (IT) and Operational Technology (OT) to ensure seamless LFM operations. A key focus is on the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) architecture, which plays a pivotal role in LFM functionality. The research addresses the critical aspect of interoperability within LFMs. It explores standardized data formats for electricity markets, the Common Information Model (CIM) for efficient data exchange, and relevant standards such as the Common Distribution Power System Model Profile (CDPSM) and the Common Grid Model Exchange Standard (CGMES). To ensure secure data exchange, the research investigates various ICT protocols and the significance of Internet of Things (IoT) protocols in enabling LFMs. It underscores the importance of a layered cybersecurity approach to protect LFM infrastructure and sensitive data. The findings of this research highlight the importance of a robust ICT architecture, coupled with secure data exchange mechanisms, to ensure the interoperability, reliability, and overall success of LFMs.

The economic and technical requirements of current changes in the distribution system are reflected in the use of all available resources and the activation of mechanisms for local use of flexibility. Local flexibility markets are evolving and face numerous obstacles for which appropriate solutions must be found. The local flexibility market will be complemented by the development of a local flexibility register, which will contain all relevant information about the flexibility assets necessary for the efficient operation of the local flexibility market. In this paper, interpretation and quantification of the flexibility sources location on the flexibility service in the distribution grid is given. The information is derived from power flow simulation results and finally written down in the form of line coefficients, which are determined by applying the least squares method to the power flow results. We have developed a Python-based simulator to perform the methodology to determine the information and test it on a realistic medium voltage distribution grid in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This paper confirms the approximate linearity of the active power changes on the demand side to the line load and to the voltage at the nodes for a given operating condition of the distribution grid.

The growing urban population drives implementation of smart city concept in various domains such as health, energy consumption, water management and air pollution systems. This paper describes smart city use case development utilizing FIWARE technology as an open-source efficient, standardized and secure smart city platform. While some basic details about FIWARE is provided, the paper is focused on the smart city architecture and use case development founded on this technology.

This paper describes the pilot implementation of blockchain technology (Ethereum) for smart grid data management in the IT environment of electrical distribution company Elektro Celje. The work focuses on the decentralised notation of smart meter data to enable secure access and prevent data misuse. The procedure for setting up the pilot project and the operational functions as well as the results of the performance tests are presented and discussed.

The growing penetration of renewable energy sources (RES) in the electrical power sector has increased the amount of distributed generation (DG) units connected at the distribution system level. In this context, new balancing challenges have arisen, creating the need for a novel use case methodology to enable an active role at the distribution system level such that transmission system operators (TSOs) can coordinate with distribution system operators (DSOs) with regard to connected resources for balancing purposes. In this study, the exploitation of the DSO-connected resources for balancing purposes in a market environment is proposed and evaluated via a novel business use case (BUC) methodology based on the categorization of IEC 62913-1. More specifically, in order to address different balancing market situations, two scenarios are considered with regard to the BUC. The first one represents the data exchange between the TSO, the DSO, and the balancing service provider (BSP). The second one represents an alternative scenario where data are exchanged directly between the TSO and the DSO, where the DSO also takes on the role of the BSP. The proposed BUC was also developed in order to validate the required data modeling and exchange mechanisms between DSOs and TSOs in order to exploit DSO-connected resources for overall system balancing purposes across different time scales.

Electricity sector has been facing many changes over the last two decades due to rise in penetration of distributed energy resources that significantly affect the operations of distribution grids. Increase in intermittent electricity production from renewable energy sources, requires activating the flexibility contained in the distributed energy resources. Local electricity market as well as demand response present a mechanism to utilize this flexibility. In this paper, we analyze potentials of energy exchange within energy community created at medium voltage feeder of Elektroprivreda BH – d.d. Sarajevo. We use software tool PVSOL Premium to model prosumers and Python for the analysis of power flows and voltage conditions. As a result, we propose the energy community interaction matrix providing the information about prosumers and consumers as a foundation for automation of local energy exchange within the energy community.

This paper investigates a secure data exchange between many small distributed consumers/prosumers and the aggregator in the process of energy balancing. It addresses the challenges of ensuring data exchange in a simple, scalable, and affordable way. The communication platform for data exchange is using Ethereum Blockchain technology. It provides a distributed ledger database across a distributed network, supports simple connectivity for new stakeholders, and enables many small entities to contribute with their flexible energy to the system balancing. The architecture of a simulation/emulation environment provides a direct connection of a relational database to the Ethereum network, thus enabling dynamic data management. In addition, it extends security of the environment with security mechanisms of relational databases. Proof-of-concept setup with the simulation of system balancing processes, confirms the suitability of the solution for secure data exchange in the market, operation, and measurement area. For the most intensive and space-consuming measurement data exchange, we have investigated data aggregation to ensure performance optimisation of required computation and space usage.