Project description
Flexible solutions for decentralised energy grids
The need for more flexible electricity markets to match demand with supply is becoming more urgent as renewables are comprising a larger portion of Europe’s energy supply. The EU-funded X-FLEX project is supporting this new era of energy generation and production. It proposes a set of integrated solutions that will facilitate the optimum combination of decentralised flexibility assets. This will allow grid operators and prosumers to offer flexible grid solutions in the local and wholesale market, creating benefits along the smart grid value chain. X-FLEX solutions will be tested in four pilot sites in three member states – Bulgaria, Greece and Slovenia. Such flexibility options are instrumental in achieving a secure, flexible, and sustainable grid that can handle supply-demand variability.
Objective
The X-FLEX project proposes a set of integrated solutions that will facilitate the optimum combination of decentralised flexibility assets, of both on the generation (DER) and on the demand side (V2G, power-to-heat/cold, batteries, demand response) enabling all parties, including final prosumers, to offer their flexibility in the local and wholesale market creating benefits to all the actors in the smart grid value chain. This flexibility will make it possible to maintain a stable and secure electricity system with a growing role of variable renewable generation, yet resilient to extreme climate events.
Up to now, the projects and research activities in this area have been focused mainly on specific energy sources and actors, considering only a very limited and isolated part of the distribution network, leaving aside all the opportunities existing throughout the flexibility offered by the energy value chain.
In this context, X-FLEX will propose a new concept that will integrate and create synergies among all energy flexibility sources and technologies, promoting cooperation of all the actors of the smart grid and energy market, in an efficient and cost-effective manner. Through this holistic approach, X-FLEX aims to create the optimal combination of decentralised flexibility assets located along the whole energy value chain and new market mechanisms, providing benefits to all the actors of the smart grid and energy market, offering an all-win scenario.
These X-FLEX project solutions will be tested in real conditions in 4 pilot sites in 3 EU Member states (Bulgaria, Slovenia and Greece), with different needs and socioeconomic and technological boundaries, involving multiple flexibility assets (batteries, power to heat/cold, vehicle to grid and other storage solutions) and all complementary actors of the energy network (DSO, TSO, microgrid operator, utilities, flexibility providers, local communities).
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
IA - Innovation actionCoordinator
46014 Valencia
Spain