Formal modeling of operational flexibility in multi-scale multi-modal energy systems

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For its stable and safe operation, the electricity system requires operational flexibility, i. e. the ability to reliably adapt power injections or consumption in reaction to fluctuations in load and generation. Flexibility is required in the context of different system services, e. g. for frequency and voltage control, for congestion management, or for the economic dispatch of energy resources. In the same way, market players can use existing flexibility for different purposes, such as optimizing their energy procurement or own consumption, avoiding imbalances, or earning revenues on markets for flexibility services. The system's flexibility requirements on the one hand, and the ability to provide such flexibility by different resources on the other hand, are usually addressed separately. The quantification of both the flexibility requirements and the potential to deliver flexibility is very often context-specific. However, in order to optimize flexibility deployment across flexibility types and across system levels – both in terms of temporal and spatial scales – the character of operational flexibility, along with its demand and supply situation should be modeled in an as generic way as possible. This facilitates finding the most efficient allocation of flexibility resources, given the flexibility requirements at the different system levels. This project sets out to develop such a formal description, making the characteristics of different flexibility options accessible to optimization tools that can coordinate its deployment. The formalized description to be developed should facilitate mathematical operations that help analyzing required and available flexibility at all temporal and spatial scales. It should also facilitate regional aggregation, and the differentiation of the time scales at which different system services must be available. It is the goal to derive a “flexibility algebra” that is inspired from computer network calculation methods, such as the Network Calculus method and its min-plus algebra.