The Virtual Power Station

This paper introduces our virtual power station concept, where individual small-scale renewable energy sites are aggregated together to form a ldquovirtualrdquo power station that appears as a single dispatchable quantity to the wider electricity system. As such a quantity has greater benefit to the wider system than the individual responses of many uncoordinated energy sites, the virtual power station can improve the payback period for renewable energy systems. The concept relies on sophisticated prediction and aggregation mechanisms, to firstly anticipate the power available from a renewable energy system, and then aggregate many small systems into one quantity with reliable output.