The transformation of the industry sector towards a climate-friendly production method will bring new challenges in the future. The use of new technologies for decarbonisation and adapted regulation will also change large industrial consumers and their operating modes on a large scale. One way of approaching this is the future utilisation of on-site flexibilities of industrial consumers through additional controllable consumers and producers, such as solar panels and electrolysers, and the further development of industries as a connected, integrated energy system. In addition to better planning and scheduling accuracy, a holistic view leads to new possibilities for influencing consumption patterns and enables grid-friendly behaviour. Consumers within an integrated industrial energy system include, for example electrolysers and charging stations, whose consumption can then be covered locally by solar panels or wind turbines. Additional flexibilisation also comes from storage technologies. In contrast to a decentralised virtual power plant, all assets in the industrial energy systems considered here are connected to the same grid connection point.
This paper analyses the effects of integrated industrial energy systems using a case studies from the industrial sector. The aim is to quantify the future flexibility potential of new technologies and the effects of various operating strategies, such as the increased use of self-generated electricity, on the upstream grid infrastructure.
For this work, a simulation framework was developed that simulates various assets as individual models and combines them as industrial hubs. These flexibility hubs are then used in a simulation to analyse the impact of a higher load fluctuation.
To begin with, the effects of on-site renewable generation from wind and PV systems and their influence on an industrial load profile are analysed. Next, the introduction of large sector-coupled consumers such as electrolysers for the production of hydrogen and e-mobility is analysed. Based on this, the two variants are then coupled in such a way that load increases can be expected in addition to new generation peaks. At the end, an additional battery storage system will be integrated.
The results should therefore show how different flexibility options can influence industrial consumption in the future and what opportunities arise from sector coupling. Other results will be, how a new regulatory framework, which allows more flexibility in load consumption for industrial consumers, will enable a more system-friendly behaviour towards the grid infrastructure.