Forecasting and validation tools for distribution networks with Active Demand

Active Demand (AD) refers to the active participation of small consumers in energy systems by means of the flexibility they can provide. Since these consumers do not have direct access to energy markets, in the EC FP7 project ADDRESS a new intermediary function, called the aggregator, has been introduced to bridge this gap. The aggregator gathers the flexibilities provided by consumers to form AD-based products, and offers the AD-based products to energy system participants through various markets. In this framework, the Distribution System Operator (DSO) has the role to check whether the traded AD-based products are compatible with the network constraints and operation. To do this, it needs suitable applications to validate the feasibility of AD-based products. The contribution of this paper is to present such applications developed within ADDRESS, together with algorithms for forecasting of load and distributed generation providing necessary inputs to validation tools.