A Profit Optimization Model for Renewable Energy Communities Based on the Distribution of Participants

After the growth of decentralized system in the energy sector due to many benefits, a new concept of Renewable energy community (REC) in Europe is introduced. REC, which comprises local generation of renewable energy sources regulated by citizens, enterprises and Public Administrations, has emerged because of the growth of renewable sources in European Union countries. There are many benefits, including social, environmental and economical for making RECs and becoming part of it. However, this concept of RECs as per RED II has presented researchers with numerous research topics and opportunities. Among these, self-consumption, energy sold and energy sharing stand out as key concepts, enabling the optimization of renewable energy sources within these RECs. This work focuses on the mathematical model considering the optimization in REC to maximize profit based on the number of prosumers and consumers. In the model, the consumers could be part of REC and also could change their role from consumer to prosumer following the constraints set by regulatory. The optimization model is developed and analyzed on hourly basis as per Italian framework. Furthermore, this work also focuses on the economic analysis using different techniques to find the profitability at different cases for the optimal REC and without REC. Numerical results are obtained for different seasons and show that there is an optimal distribution of prosumers and consumers in which maximum profit can be obtained.