Future Flex is a participant-led trial of second generation DSO services, deploying step-change innovations for procurement, testing and delivery suitable for domestic scale assets. The project will focus on active power demand reduction services. The benefits will be increased market liquidity and competition – and resulting lower costs of flex service provision.
Benefits
Facilitation of Domestic Flexibility services. This should reduce costs of participation, increase liquidity in the market and ultimately reduce the cost of flexibility procurement.
Learnings
Outcomes
Phase: 1. Participant feedback
FutureFlex Workshop Primer
FutureFlex Workshop Participant Feedback
Ideas for Trial May 2020
Phase: 2A. DSO-Ready Homes DSO-Ready Homes definitions
DSO-Ready Homes: realizing the value of domestic
energy efficiency in GB electricity distribution – July 2021
DSO-Ready Homes: Roundtable output – slides and discussion note
DSO-Ready Homes: Interventions document
Additional supporting material :Report with detailed analysis of value of energy efficiency (the supporting paper to ‘realising the value of
domestic energy efficiency in GB electricity distribution.
Phase 2B. Sustain-H (including Aggregated Datasets)
Sustain-H Opportunity
Sustain-H Design Guidance
Value Calculator
Sustain-H Product roadmap
Aggregated Datasets Methodology
Aggregated Datasets Third party datasets analysis
Aggregated Datasets: Third party and Sustain-H datasets Analysis
Additional supporting material : Detailed design report (May 2020). Gap Analysis paper (Document 1B),
Aug 2021
Phase 2C. Pro Low Carbon
Carbon Assessment Methodologies Carbon Impact of DSO flexibility services
Additional Supporting Material : Excel tool supporting carbon
Lessons Learnt
DSO Ready Homes Changes in domestic energy consumption can reduce the prevalence and severity of network constraints in two distinct yet complementary ways.
Flexibility allows home energy usage to respond to appropriate signals, shifting energy consumption outside of peak times. Flexibility is ideal for ensuring that non-time-specific consumption does not undulycontribute to network constraints – for example, charging electric vehicles at times of ample network capacity.
Energy efficiency delivers permanent changes to consumption patterns, reducing rather than shifting demand. Energy efficiency has the greatest network value when applied to consumption for which significant shifts in time are difficult, or where efficiency can act as an enabler for flexibility. An example is the growing demand for electrical heat in homes during winter evenings, which energy efficiency can permanently reduce and can also enable to be shifted, helping homes to act as thermal stores.
Flexibility and energy efficiency are complementary, and their combined effect may be required where network constraints are most severe.
Sustain-H There is high interest in DSO services in provision of domestic flex. FutureFlex originally targeted inclusion of two participants for the operational trial but ended up with 7. However, a key challenge in securing signup was the low value of Sustain-H.
Sustain-H For domestic flex, there is a close relationship between network time-of-use (ToU) tariffs and DSO services. As network charging rules are governed at national level, in this project we focused on amending DSO services which lie within a DNO’s direct control. However, we believe that there are many benefits to a time-of-use approach baked into network charging arrangements which merit consideration– less administration, avoiding tricky baselining questions, avoiding asset qualification requirements. We strongly recommend that this is considered further, as in the mid to long term it is likely more sustainable and appropriate than a scheduled DSO service.
Sustain-H There is also a diversity of views on the treatment of data We received a diversity of comments from participants’ legal teams regarding treatment of personal data. For instance, some parties suggested amendments to the contract to reflect two-factor authentication, auto-delete of emails, and were concerned to clarify who was classified as data controller. Others did not have these requirements.
Pro Low Carbon - Assessing the carbon impact of DSO flexibility services requires a specialised approach. Measuring carbon impact is not the same task as measuring carbon emissions. An understanding of total greenhouse gas emissions is useful when dealing with energy generation, but the role of flexibility services is not simply to supply electricity to the grid. Flexibility services interact with the electricity network and influence the makeup of grid generation. The impact of this interaction needs to be measured, which is why measuring carbon emissions from just the flexibility asset itself is not sufficient. Understanding the impacts arising from both the flexibility technologies themselves and their interactions with the grid requires a unique approach as the complexity of the problem can be.
General - An agile approach to innovation delivers better results, more efficiently – and there is potential to update processes to better facilitate this
General - Availability of business-as-usual teams is crucial to success – product management best practice methods may be a solution. These are crucial if products and services tested in innovation are to make their way into the business and deliver value to customers. Having access to what business thinking is therefore vital to success.
