Water Utility De Watergroep to Present Their Successful Implementation of Actility's Automated Demand Response at European Utility Week

AMSTERDAM, November 5, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --

The first results of the smart water projects based on ELIA's imbalance prices will be presented at the event

The Belgian water distribution company De Watergroep has successfully launched together with Actility the first water plant management project in the world based on the imbalance price system from the transmission system operator. The project relies also on an agreement with Electrabel acting as current supplier and remunerator for flexibility. As a result the energy costs of the water pumping stations are significantly reduced.

This project will be presented by Bart De Schrijver, process engineer at De Watergroep during European Utility Week in Amsterdam. On November 6 at 2pm he will describe the first project results in Session 21: Smart Grids: A new frontier for the Water sector. "This is an ongoing process but we already have promising results and are excited about future prospects," said Bart de Schrijver.

The growing integration of renewable energy sources results in highly fluctuating electricity prices. When electricity production from solar or wind farms in the country are above expectations, ELIA's imbalance prices for a given quarter of an hour decrease, sometimes even to negative values. When such events occur, De Watergroep will respond by adjusting the power consumption of water pumps to store more water than forecasted at lower costs. When electricity consumption exceeds production, imbalance prices will soar, potentially even up to 4500€/MWh in cases where generation capacity would become insufficient to meet demand. During these critical periods, Actility will curtail pumping on the sites and sell the unconsumed electricity to the grid. This benefits both the power system with a more secure grid and De Watergroep by lowering their electricity bill.

Based on their energy and IT expertise, Actility has developed an optimal control automation tool taking into account the specific requirements of water distribution companies. Thanks to key modeling innovations and new predictive algorithms, the origination of such a green asset has been possible while ensuring security of operation of the installations and guaranteeing water supply. The energy consumption of the pump responds to price variations, while the level in water tanks and the pressure in the water supply are maintained at a correct level.

"This project reveals the untapped grid flexibility of such big power consumers. We believe that such projects are key in meeting European climate objectives. It also brings new revenues to such able customers," said Ivo Van Vaerenbergh, Vice-President of Actility Benelux.

Actility  

Actility is a provider of smart energy management services based on innovative Smart-Grid technology. Actility's Smart-Grid applications focus on demand optimization and management, including Demand Response, Load Shifting and Admission Control. Actility allows industrial companies to reduce electricity costs by providing demand-side management services together with optimization and modelling software applications. Actility is also an industry leader in Machine to Machine (M2M) large-scale infrastructure with ThingPark®, the new generation of standards-based M2M communication platform. Actility's ThingPark Wireless® network provides long-range coverage for low-power sensors used in Smart City, Smart Building and Smart Factory applications.