Air-Conditioning Can Help the Power Grid instead of Overloading It

The following article was reprinted with permission. SpeechIt’s an online broadcast covering the latest research.

As summer comes, people open the air conditioner in most of the US, but if you are like me, you always feel a little guilty about it. Past generations were ruled without air conditioning – do I really need it? And how bad is it to use all this electricity to cool in a world of warming?

If I quit my air conditioner, I will warm up. However, if everyone opens the air conditioner at the same time, electricity network operators to activate some parts of electrical demand increases The most expensive and dirty power plants. Sometimes these pointed ends can ask the grill too much and Brownouts or deductions.

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Research I It makes me feel a little better, yet released with an academician team in the near future. We saw that it is possible Coordin the work of a large number of home air conditioning unitsBalancing supply and demand to the power network – and without having to endure high temperatures in their homes.

Studies throughout these lines, Remote control of air conditioners For many years to support the grill Investigated theoretical possibilities like this. However, in practice and never such a valuable practice, and very little approaches have been shown on this scale. The system we developed not only showed the ability to balance the grill in seconds of seconds, but also proved that it is possible to do so without affecting the comfort of the residents.

Benefits include the reliability of the power network, which facilitates the grid to accept more renewable energy. Our aim is to transform air conditioners from a challenge to a challenge for the power network and to support a shift towards cleaner from fossil fuels.

Adjustable equipment

My research focuses on batteries, solar panels and electric equipment – such as electric vehicles, water heaters, air conditioners and heat pumps – self -adjust with Consume different amounts of energy at different times.

Originally USA Electrical grille was built To carry electricity to customers’ homes and businesses, one of the major power plants. And initially, the power plants were large, central operations that burn coal or natural gas or harvesting energy from nuclear reactions. These plants were typically present and they could set up how much power they produce in response to customer demand, so they will be balanced between the power from grid manufacturers and consumers.

But the grill has changed. There is More renewable energy sourcePower is not always available – such as solar panels at night or wind turbines on calm days. And there are devices and equipment I work with. These new options, called “distributed energy resources ,, produce energy close to the place where consumers need, or warehouses or how much energy they use in real time.

One aspect of the network has not changed: There is not much storage to the system. So every time you open each light, there is not enough electricity to provide everything that wants it for a moment: the grill needs a power manufacturer to produce a little more power. And when you turn off a light, there is a little too much: a power manufacturer needs to be reduced.

The way of knowing that real -time power adjustments of energy power plants are needed is closely monitoring the grid frequency. The aim is always to provide electricity – 60 hertz – at a fixed frequency. If more power than produced is needed, the frequency decreases and an electrical power plant increases output. If too much power is produced, frequency increases and a slightly slowing production of an electrical power plant. These actions take place in seconds to keep the grid in balance.

This output flexibility is primarily the key to keeping lights open for everyone, primarily from power plants.

Finding new options

I am interested in how distributed energy sources can increase the flexibility in the network. They can release or consume more energy to respond to changing supply or demand, and can help balance the grill and keep the frequency near 60 hertz.

Some people fear that doing this may be an invader Someone outside his house The ability to control your battery or air conditioner. Therefore, we wanted to see if we could help balance the grid with frequency arrangement using house air conditioning units instead of energy power plants, without affecting how comfortable the residents use their devices or how comfortable they are in their homes.

From 2019 to 2023, my group at the University of Michigan tried this approach in cooperation with the US Department of Energy, Pecan Street Inc., Los Alamos National Laboratory and Berkeley University. Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy.

To perform the real world test of our system, we hired 100 hosts in Austin and Texas. In all homes, all the home we connected to special control boards and sensors, which the owners allow us to upload to their homes, had compulsory air cooling systems. This equipment allows us to send instructions to air conditioning units according to the frequency of the grill.

Before explaining how the system works, I first need to explain how thermostats work. When people set the thermostats, they choose a temperature and the thermostat opens and closes the air conditioner compressor to protect the air temperature in a small range around this setting point. If the temperature is set to 68 degrees, the thermostat opens AC when it is 70, for example, and closes it to 66.

Every few seconds, our system has changed the timing of the air conditioner compressor switch for some of 100 air conditioners, causing the total power consumption of the units to change. In this way, our small home air conditioners group, as an energy power plant reacts to the network, to balance the network and keep the frequency near 60 hertz to use more or less energy.

In addition, our system is designed to keep home temperatures in the same small temperature range around the setting point.

Testing the approach

We run our system in four hours of one hour. We found two encouraging results.

First, he was able to do air conditioners Provide frequency arrangement At least as accurate as a traditional power plant. Therefore, we have shown that air conditioners can play an important role in increasing the network flexibility. But perhaps more importantly – at least in order to encourage people to participate in such systems – we found that we can do this without affecting the comfort of people’s homes.

We found home temperatures 1.6 did not deviate more than Fahrenheit Set points. The landlords were allowed to invalidate controls if they were uncomfortable, but most of them did not. We have received requests to invalidate zero for most tests. In the worst case, we received requests for invalid from the two houses in our test.

In practice, such a technology can be added Internet connected thermostats that can be obtained commercially. In exchange for loans on energy bills, users can choose to participate in a service carried out by the Thermostat company, a public service provider or another third party.

Later, people can open the air conditioner in the summer heat without these guilt buds, knowing that they help host the network more reliable and renewable energy sources – without compromising their comfort in the process.

This article was initially published Speech. Read original article.