A regional electricity market approach in view of related Smart Grid initiatives

The transformation of conventional electricity supply infrastructures towards a more decentralized and sustainable provision requires technical and economical solutions which appropriately adapt to the new requirements and exploit arising efficiency potentials. This contribution introduces a reference architecture for regional electricity markets which allows the integration of small scale actors into the conventional supply infrastructure. Moreover, we provide a schematic comparison of architecture-related Smart Grid initiatives based on different evaluation criteria and relate them to our approach. This way we show that our market-oriented approach is intended to fill a gap in the Smart Grids domain by addressing trading-related issues.