The New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) of Japan launched the “Development of Flexible and Distributed Energy Resources Control Technology to Mitigate Congestion in Power Systems (FLEX DER Project)” aiming at reducing the renewable energy output curtailment. A group consisting of 10 parties, including TEPCO Power Grid and Waseda University, was selected to develop the technology required for Japan’s first “DER Flexibility System*” and conduct a field demonstration.

Specifically, the DER Flexibility System, which will serve as the core of a platform that enables the sharing of information on grid congestion and the utilization of distributed energy resources (DER) such as the state of charging of storage batteries will be developed to verify the effectiveness of DER control, mitigation of grid congestion, and reduction of renewable energy output curtailment. The system will perform matching and allocation of curtailment amount in procurement of DER flexibility, as well as issuing commands. This will enable, for example, when transmission lines become congested due to renewable energy output, the aggregator will adjust the operation of DER to reduce the amount of electricity fed into the transmission lines, thereby avoiding congestion in the transmission lines without curtailing the output of renewable energy.

The implementation period is from FY 2022 to FY 2024.　

*DER flexibility is defined as the ability to flexibly change the magnitude of power generated and power consumed by loads.