Aggregated Use of Energy Flexibility in Office Buildings

Due to climate change consequences, all Member States of the European Union signed an agreement with the goal of becoming the first society and economy with a neutral impact on the planet by 2050. The building sector is one of the highest energy consumers, using 33% of global energy production. Given the global increase for energy demand, implementing energy flexibility strategies is crucial for a better integration of renewable energy sources and a reduction of consumption peaks arising from the electrification of energy demand. The work described in this paper aims to develop an optimization algorithm to use the existing aggregated energy flexibility in office buildings to reduce both the electric energy costs of each office, considering the tariffs applied at each moment and the total power peak, aiming to reduce the entire building's cost of the contracted power, considering the Portuguese context. The obtained results conclude that it is possible to reduce both the costs associated with electric energy consumption and contracted power. Nevertheless, since the cost of contracted power has a lower impact on the overall energy bill, it is more beneficial to focus only on the reduction of costs associated with electric energy consumption in the considered case study.