A Distributed Power Market for the Smart Grid

Abstract

To address the challenges of resource allocation in the Smart Electrical Grid a new power market is proposed. A distributed and autonomous contract net based market system in which participants, represented by the agents, engage in two distinct yet interconnected markets in order to determine resource allocation. Key to this proposed design is the 2 market structure which separates negotiations between consumers and reliable generation from negotiations between consumers and intermittent energy resources. The first or primary market operates as a first price sealed bid reverse auction while the second or secondary market utilizes a uniform price auction. In order to evaluate this new market a simulator is developed and the market is modeled and tested within it. The results of these tests indicate that the proposed design is an effective method of allocating electrical grid resources amongst consumers, generators, and intermittent energy resources with some feasibility and scalability limitations.