Flexibilitäten in der Regelenergie nutzen und Zusatzerlöse erwirtschaften

Use flexibilities and earn money with balancing energy

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According to estimates, there are 4,000 to 6,000 emergency power generators in Germany that can be integrated into a virtual power plant based on their size. Do you operate a standby power system for a medical facility, data centre, telecommunications company or cold store? Has it already occurred to you that this emergency generator can also earn money profitably through flexibility marketing and control energy in addition to its actual operation? But what does that mean? Even if you are the operator of a power generation system such as a combined heat and power unit (CHP) or a PV system, the following explanations could be of interest to you for an increase in yield.

Marketing on the power exchange

By networking an energy plant with BentoNet, ad-hoc energy can be fed in from the emergency backup when needed. BentoNet optimises and controls these inflows and also markets the surplus electricity. This means that active participation in various energy markets is open to you as a plant operator. But optimising your own load profile and peak capping are also additional possible applications here.

Benefits:

Your system continues to serve its intended purpose and also generates additional revenue for your company – while at the same time reducing costs in administration and sales.

In order to minimise your own additional expenditure and to fulfil all legal requirements, it makes sense to use the know-how and infrastructure of an established provider. With the connection to our BentoNet, you receive the complete solution from a single source. You provide control power with your plant and we have the corresponding market access to participate in direct marketing easily and without effort. Coupled with a secure and reliable infrastructure that fulfils all the necessary legal requirements, we act as an aggregator, so to speak, connecting many small, independent, decentralised plants. This means that the power plant minimum size of 5 MW, which is actually required, does not apply to the individual operator.

A connection to BentoNet also offers you the opportunity to make an active contribution to climate protection and reduce energy costs in the process. In times of Fridays for Future, this is an additional image gain that you can expand and use. As an IoT application, BentoNet is simple, fast, secure and cost-effective. Talk to us. We will tell you what you need to do for this and calculate the optimal solution for you and your plant.

Künstliche Intelligenz in der Energieversorgung

What can artificial intelligence contribute to the energy transition?

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Statistical data analyses and thus also the Internet of Things (IoT) are influencing our everyday lives more and more – consciously or quite inconspicuously. They have rapidly found their way into many areas and their enormous potential is far from exhausted. Above all, plant manufacturers, companies and the energy industry should look into this instrument of digitalisation, which implies a high economic power.

What does IoT mean for the energy sector?

The IoT virtually connects the real world with the digital one. It can collect and transform vast amounts of data. The interconnected devices act independently, adapt to circumstances and react to certain scenarios. Any mediation or intervention by the user becomes superfluous. It creates measurable values that offer an enormous opportunity for efficient operation, especially for plant manufacturers, plant operators and energy companies – as long as the collected raw data is precisely evaluated, analysed and implemented.

What potential resides in data collection and data flows?

Accurate data analysis not only turns the data into cash, but also shows forward-looking changes, for example:

  • Load profile optimisation to reduce energy procurement costs
  • Early fault detection and analysis for technical systems such a CHP units, construction or industrial washing machines
  • Reduction of energy consumption through digital energy management
  • IT security

Requirements for the use of artificial intelligence and big data in the energy sector

A system that performs such tasks is complex and must meet high safety requirements. A large number of components and services are required, which must be coordinated with each other. Examples of components and services are:

  • Hardware box
  • IF
  • Mobile radio
  • VPN + MPLS
  • Pooling
  • Storage
  • Analytics
  • Service: IBN of the entire route

By the way: Our end-to-end-services as IaaS and SaaS means that your systems are always up to date and secure without your own investment.

BentoNet offers such an IoT solution as a complete package. As an ecosystem, it combines existing and new data services with a perfectly coordinated infrastructure. It is able to capture data streams from industry and the energy sector. But BentoNet also enables software developers, engineering firms and plant manufacturers to quickly get started with analytics clouds. For this purpose, we create an individual overall concept from collecting the data to evaluating it and, if desired, feeding it back into the plant.

How does BentoNet help in the implementation and use of data volumes?

BentoNet offers the following data tools that can be accessed with little effort:

  • Internet of Things (IoT)
  • Blockchain
  • Big Data
  • Big Data Discovery
  • Application Images
  • API Interface
  • Database
  • Business Intelligence
  • Industry 4.0

Artificial intelligence can therefore offer enormous potential for the long-term improvement of asset management, but the aspect of security must not be forgotten.

Smart City und intelligente Energieverteilung

Smart City: Energy distribution in the city of the future

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The Smart City needs many solutions.

Thanks to the Fridays for Future movement, climate change and the urgent need for action have entered the consciousness of even more people. The pressure on politicians and responsible actors in the energy sector and other areas is increasing. But how can an effective energy transition succeed in the future “smart cities”? In the following, we show how a virtual power plant can drive the energy transition in conurbations, reducing additional work for plant operators, saving costs and generating profitable additional revenues at the same time.

Digital platforms – the energy system of the future in fully networked cities?

The smart city needs many solutions: Building automation, e-government, autonomous driving, 5G, public transport, smart factory, smart home and even charging e-scooters – but also a sustainable decentralised energy supply.
The energy transition is a must. And for its implementation, new and fast-acting strategies are urgently needed. This requires a rethink and decisive action across the entire energy market.

But what do innovative models in the industry look like?

How can smaller plant operators and companies also act professionally and economically and further and reliably expand the energy transition? How can energy bottlenecks in the supply be avoided at the same time? What role does digitalisation play?

One thing is certain: the German energy market is already undergoing a power plant turnaround. Coal and nuclear power plants are being phased out. Practical tests show that a full supply of renewable energies is realistic and that large power plants can be replaced. With the energy transition, the number of decentralised, renewable generation plants is steadily increasing. They all have to ensure security of supply, economic efficiency and sustainability. These decentralised plants must therefore be intelligently and efficiently networked and controlled. Challenges of a new generation of power plants that have to be mastered.

Sustainable energy supply in the green city

In a nutshell: The digitalisation platform itself is not an electricity producer. It combines decentralised, smaller energy systems such as combined heat and power plants, wind, water and solar systems into a networked, flexibly adjustable and centrally controlled system (building management). This involves an extremely high IT effort. The information from all the connected systems comes together in the control system. With the help of a separate computer centre, as with BentoNet, the data is coordinated in real time. They provide information about the utilisation status of each individual plant and calculate forecasts for possible energy fluctuations. This sensitive data communication takes place with the support of particularly secure connections.

Controllable plants such as hydropower plants, CHPs or emergency generators play a special role in the energy transition. In the event of an oversupply of electricity, they can on the one hand throttle or interrupt their production (negative control energy) and on the other feed additional electricity (positive control energy) into the grid in the event of an electricity shortage. Tenant power solutions can also be realised in this way, with which tenants can benefit directly from the sustainable and cheap electricity of the decentralised plants – keyword Smart Factory.

What can a digital platform do?

The purpose of a platform is mainly the joint marketing of electricity and flexible and reliable access to power from the aggregated plants at any time. The particular strength of a shared infrastructure is its rapid adaptability. This flexibility – a clear differentiator from traditional large-scale power plants, by the way – enables adaptable trading on the exchange to market the generated electricity profitably.

How viable are platforms as business models in the energy market of the future?

Renewable energies are land-intensive. Their production will take place outside the urban centres. Therefore, the energy market of the future will be determined by virtual power plants in smart cities.

Digital technologies help to network the connected plants in a meaningful way and to process the data sustainably. A flood of information hits the infrastructure on site every minute; analogue calculation is impossible. So digitalisation has already successfully made its way here. In the future, the energy market will be dominated by decentralised power generation and battery storage technologies, and the further development of intelligent networking will be forced. The Internet of Things (IoT) will also play a major role in this. Examples of this are charging management and load distribution in e-mobility. There is no chance of a successful energy transition without digitalisation. Optimal asset management ensures climate-friendly electricity and is certainly up to the challenge of digitalisation.

With a stake in a digital platform, plant operators also have access to various markets. They can have their electricity traded on the exchange or contribute to reliable utilisation via the balancing energy market. The goal for the operator must be to generate positive strategic and business effects.

IoT platforms with TSO compliance such as BentoNet offer operators security of supply, efficient and transparent plant operation with energy management, greater economic efficiency, workload reduction and – last but not least – the opportunity to make an active contribution to climate protection. It is simple, fast, secure and cost-effective.