Prosumer-Centric Self-Sustained Smart Grid Systems

Modern smart grid systems exploit a two-way interaction paradigm between the utility and the electricity user and promote the role of prosumer, as a new user type, able to generate and sell energy, or consume energy. Within such a setting, the prosumers and their interactions with the microgrid system become of high significance for its efficient operation. In this article, to model the corresponding interactions, we introduce a labor economics-based framework by exploiting the principles of contract theory, that jointly achieves the satisfaction of the various interacting system entities, i.e., the microgrid operator (MGO) and the prosumers. The MGO offers personalized rewards to the sellers and buyers, to incentivize them to sell and purchase energy, respectively. To provide a stable and efficient operation point, while aiming at jointly satisfying the profit and requirements of the involved competing parties, optimal personalized contracts, i.e., rewards and amount of sold/purchased energy, are determined, by formulating and solving contract-theoretic optimization problems between the MGO and the sellers or buyers. The analysis is provided for both cases of complete and incomplete information availability regarding the prosumers’ types. Detailed numerical results are presented to demonstrate the operation characteristics of the proposed framework under diverse scenarios.