Distributed Energy Prosumer Communities and the Application of Emerging Technologies: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

Energy prosumer communities offer a mechanism where prosumers can share, and trade locally produced renewable generation directly with consumers within the same energy community. Accordingly, there is need for a decentralized approaches that enables prosumers to locally balance generation and consumption. The deployment of emerging technologies such as Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), Internet of Things (IoT), and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can accelerate the integration of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) and advance the development of energy internet. Therefore, this article develops an energy system architecture that shows how DLT, IoT, and AI can be deployed to support the design and actualization of energy internet in Distributed Prosumer Energy Communities (DPEC). The system architecture support energy sharing and trading from energy prosumers to consumer. Findings from this study presents how DLT based smart contracts can be employed to securely manage energy transactions within the energy internet. The system architecture provides energy consumers and prosumers with a decentralized approach for sharing and trading local energy generation without requiring any central intermediary. More importantly, this study presents a use case on the applicability of DLT and AI to support micro grid operations in DPEC.