Tennet begins internet-of-things grid balancing project

Dutch electricity transmission system operator Tennet has begun a 12-month project to test how a network of household devices such as heat pumps, domestic batteries and PV arrays could ease grid bottlenecks.

With the Dutch grid company struggling to match a rising tide of solar and wind power generation with customer demand, Tennet in January announced its intent to explore how groupings of smart household appliances could be deployed to even out electricity demand across the grid, thus freeing up network capacity to accommodate more renewables generation.

This month, Tennet announced the start of trial which will see appliances including rooftop PV systems, heat pumps, electric vehicle (EV) chargers, batteries, and night storage heaters bundled into a virtual power plant (VPP) by Munich-based energy internet-of-things business Greencom Networks.

The VPP created by Greencom will be available for Tennet to draw upon to ease grid congestion when required, via the blockchain-based Equigy crowd balancing platform developed by Tennet alongside Italian, Swiss and Austrian peers Terna, Swissgrid and APG, respectively.

As part of the trial, participating households will “benefit economically through the offered flexibility of their installations,” according to a press release published on the Tennet website.

No further details of the payments available were specified and it was not made clear where the participating households will be based, with Tennet also operating in Germany.