Real-time Energy Control Approach for Smart Home Energy Management System

This article investigates a real-time energy control approach for a home energy management system, including the electric water heater, air conditioner, clothes dryer, electric vehicle, photovoltaic cell, critical loads, and battery system. A demand response mechanism is proposed to enable households to participate in demand response services. Half-hour-ahead rolling optimization and a real-time control strategy are combined to achieve household economic benefits and ability to deal with complex operating environments. A fuzzy logic controller is utilized to determine battery charging/ discharging power; proper rules are proposed to ensure benefits from operating the battery under the real-time electricity price. The simulation test results indicate that the proposed control approach can optimize the schedule for home appliances and battery charging/ discharging behavior, even if the forecasted information is not accurate. A physical test platform has also been established and tested in the lab to support the operation of the whole system.