Minimizing storage costs by substituting centralized electrical storage by thermal storage at the end user, also suppling balancing power for grid operation

Many processes in industrial and domestic applications require heating or cooling at certain steps of a process. Even if the process itself cannot be shifted towards periods of high PV output (which would be favorable), the heating and cooling necessities can be carried out via an inexpensive thermal storage instead of a costly electrical storage. Examples are: distillation units, washing machines, dishwashers, coolers, freezers. The resulting “shiftability” of power consumption can be a business model by offering that availability of load dispatching on the balancing power market. An example using PCM as cooling storage for refrigerators that has been investigated: A focus of this paper is the use of that load shifting ability to provide balancing power. Another emphasis is on the protection of individual consumer data: To keep the state of use of each individual consumer (actually: interactive consumer or “prosumer”) anonymous, but still performing the sales of balancing power, the orders for load-dispatching can be transmitted via transmitted via a regional, non-individual broadcasting message within the GSM network. Demonstrating DSMs capacities, abilities and limits concerning domestic applications is an important task to prepare large-scale implementation and to convince stakeholders. To reaching that goal, several realistic DSM scenarios for cooling applications and freezers have been developed with the prerequisite that DSM activities are supposed to be without comfort losses and without restrictions for consumers while the limits for lower and upper temperature for food are maintained.